Around three days after receiving a report from Assuta hospital in Rishon Lezion that there had been an embryo mix-up following IVF treatment there, the Health Ministry has banned the department from accepting new patients until the incident is thoroughly investigated.
The mix-up was discovered following the performance of a genetic test on a pregnant woman who had undergone an embryo transfer procedure as part of the IVF process. The test revealed that she was carrying an embryo that was genetically incompatible with either her or her partner.
According to Channel 12 News, the Ministry has established a special team of professionals to make an external long-term review of processes at the hospital and to discover how the mix-up could have happened.
"The administration of Assuta has decided not to accept new patients to the IVF department until further notice," the hospital said in a statement.
Meanwhile, Assuta has stated that they have identified a patient who is not currently pregnant and that there is a high probability that she is the mother of the wrongly implanted embryo. However, the embryo belonging to the woman who received the wrong transfer has yet to be located, and there are fears that it could already have been implanted in another woman.