Zeitschrift für Zytokinbiologie

Abstrakt

The Cytokine Network: An Integrated Approach to Understanding the Mechanism of Unexplained Recurrent Implantation Failures

Alphonsus Ogbonna Ogbuabor, Peter Uwadiegwu Achukwu, Silas Anayo Ufelle, Daniel Chukwuemeka Ogbuabor and Emeka Ernest Neboh

Unexplained recurrent implantation failure has become a public health problem especially in the context of a high
cost, demand for assisted reproductive therapy and multiple therapy failures. It is attributed to the failure of
immunological tolerance between the transferred embryo and the endometrium during assisted reproductive therapy
cycles. Cytokines are surrogate mediators of immunological tolerance mechanisms. Since the synergistic
interactions between individual cytokines is dynamic, perturbations in the cytokine network during implantation is
considered a major etiology for unexplained recurrent implantation failures. So far reproductive immunologists have
not elucidated a comprehensive picture of the cytokine network in patients with unexplained recurrent implantation
failures. This is a major factor limiting our understanding of the mechanism of unexplained recurrent implantation
failures. The cytokine network appears to be a good toolkit to understanding the mechanism of unexplained
recurrent implantation failures. We present an overview on cytokine interactions during embryo implantation using
the cytokine network. Suggestions are put forward for future approach that may significantly improve our
understanding of the cytokine network in unexplained recurrent implantation failures