Acupuncture can help provide physical and emotional support leading up to and throughout an IVF cycle.
In particular, it can be used on the day, or within 24 hours of embryo transfer. Ideally, your acupuncturist would accompany you to your embrio transfer so that you could have your acupuncture treatment, in situ, just before and after transfer.
Most IVF clinics don’t yet provide facilities for acupuncture on their premises but it is still worth asking them and checking for future policy changes.
Instead, what most people do, and which is just as valuable, is to see their acupuncturist at his or her practice, on the way to the IVF clinic and on the way back.
A recent study in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) has shown that acupuncture may increase the success rate of implantation and pregnancy by as much as 65%. To learn more please visit: www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/336/7643/545.
It suggests that acupuncture increases the flow of blood to the uterus and relaxes uterine muscle to aid transfer and increase uterine receptivity. It also regulates and calms the sympathetic nervous system and helps to reduce stress responses that might otherwise inhibit implantation.