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NT Bureau
Chennai, Aug 27:
 

LATE MOTHERHOOD: 56-year-old Brinda with her twins at Akash Fertility Centre and Hospital. Photo : K Vijay Anand

        The 28-year-long wait for Alagappan and his wife Brinda to enjoy parental bliss came to an end this morning, thanks to a major scientific breakthrough.

        Despite attaining menopause 11 years ago, 56-year-old Brinda delivered twin babies (both boys) at a private hospital here, which doctors claim to be the first of its kind in India.Both the babies, delivered through an hour-long caesarean operation, and the mother were in good health. As she could not bear a child even 28 years after marriage, Brinda, a former employee of IOB, had approached the Akash Fertility Centre and Hospital in November last year. Medical tests had revealed that the woman's uterus was healthy and that 57-year-old Alagappan's sperm count was less. Intra Cytoplasmic Sperm Injection (ICSU) process was adopted by using donor eggs as she had attained menopause, leading to her conceiving the same year.

        'Since she had attained menoapuse, it was difficult for her to conceive and bear a child. We took it up as a challenge. We got donor eggs, used the sperms of Alagappan and an embryo was developed and transferred to Brinda by ICSA process', Gynaecologist and infertility specialist Dr Jeyarani Kamaraj of the hospital and her husband Kamaraj.

        Dr Jeyarani said this was another proof of the effect of modern day medicine and scientific treatment. She said a 59-year-old American woman Lauren Cohen had delivered twins in July 2006, thus becoming the oldest woman in the world to do so. The woman was conceived by In-Vitro Fertilisation (IVF) using a donor egg.

        'We have already performed more than 200 ICSI procedures and also through the common IVF process. The unqiue thing about this surgery is that an old woman conceiving after attaining menopause and delivering twins', Dr Jeyarani said.

        A beaming Alagappan and his family members named the first boy as Akash, after the hospital, and the second son as Rishikesh.