• We have updated the guidelines regarding posting political content: please see the stickied thread on Website Issues.

Twins & Other Birth Multiples (Triplets, Etc.)

India's twins pose DNA puzzle

By Rajan Chakravarty
BBC in Mohammad Pur Umri

Scientists from around the world are flocking to a small Indian village to try to find out why an extraordinarily large number of identical twins are being born there.

One in 10 births in Mohammad Pur Umri, near Allahabad, involves twins, most of them identical. Looking at the faces of Umri's residents, you can be forgiven for wondering if you have stepped onto the set of a sci-fi film on cloning.

Globally, the odds of a woman giving birth to identical twins is one in 300.

"Over the last 10-15 years, the number of twin births has gone up significantly," Netaji, a village headman who has lived in Umri for over 70 years, told BBC World Service's Outlook programme.

"There would have been more, but infant mortality has claimed many lives."

'Genetic gold mine'

For the last six months, when a local daily carried the story about the unusually high incidence of identical twins in Umri, scientists and members of the international media have descended upon the sleepy hamlet.

We believe these twins are a gift from God, and nothing else
Village headman Netaji
Click to expand...

Among the visitors has been a team of DNA experts from the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) in Hyderabad.

They have been busy collecting blood samples from the residents of Umri, which is viewed as a "genetic gold mine" in the scientific community.

Identical twins emerge from a single fertilised egg, while non-identical twins are born if a woman carrying two eggs has both fertilised simultaneously.

But scientists remain unsure if twinning is entirely a chance phenomenon. DNA experts hope the blood samples of Umri's residents will provide a clue to whether there is a genetic basis for it, and if DNA rearrangement during the embryonic development is responsible.

One theory put forward has been that the high numbers of twins is due to the high numbers of marriages between relatives, which, in the strongly Muslim village, are encouraged.

While villagers admit that marriages between relatives are not infrequent, they dismiss the theory that inbreeding is the reason. According to them, marriages between relatives take place in other Muslim-dominated villages too - yet these places do not have as many twins as Umri.

"We believe these twins are a gift from God, and nothing else," village leader Netaji said.

"The land of this area, between the two great rivers, Ganges and Yamuna, is very fertile. That is why this phenomenon occurs.

"Whether it's sugar cane or twin children, this land has always been very fertile."

Confusion

While scientists may disagree with this explanation, many of the other villagers agree.

There's something in the soil that produces so many identical twins
Villager Abu Saad
Click to expand...

"This phenomenon is partly a gift of nature, and partly a gift of the land of this village," said Abu Saad, a 20-year-old who has two pairs of twin sisters among his eight siblings.

"There's something in the soil that produces so many identical twins."

Among Saad's eight siblings are two pairs of identical twins - "an extremely rare occurrence", according to the DNA experts at CCMB.

The most celebrated twins in the village are the oldest surviving ones, Guddu and Munnu. Guddu said that even his wife occasionally gets confused between the two - one of a great number of stories of confusion involving the twins throughout the village.

"Once my brother had a quarrel with someone in the neighbourhood," Gudu recalled.

"When I saw him being taken away by the police, I followed, trying to find out what had happened.

"As I approached a policeman, he angrily asked me to accompany him to the station. I told them I wasn't the person they'd first held - I was wearing a white suit, my brother was dressed differently.

"But they wouldn't listen. I was only let out when the confusion cleared, a few hours later."

The young twins of Umri attract a lot of attention at a nearby madrasa, or Islamic school.

A very Indian custom of dressing up identical twins in the same clothes has only made matters worse for the teachers, who find it hard at the best of times to differentiate between the children.

The scope for confusion is endless.

Meanwhile, scientists in hi-tech labs thousands of miles away from the dust bowl that is Umri will peer down their microscopes and try to match DNA strains, seeking an answer to one of the more baffling genetic puzzles of our times.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/programmes/3500591.stm

Published: 2004/02/23 16:34:04 GMT

© BBC MMIV
Click to expand...
 
Twins break left arms on same night

Story here

They say twins feel each other's pain, but 8-year-olds Cassidy and Marissa Wiese of Laurel might have taken that idea a bit too far.

In a five-hour span on April 17, both girls had rolling skating accidents that resulted in broken left arms.

Cassidy broke her arm while skating at a friend's birthday party. Later that evening Marissa was demonstrating her skating skill to her mother, Tami, when she fell and broke her arm.

"I just kept saying, 'You have got to be kidding me,"' Tami Wiese said.

The twins were outfitted in matching blue casts. Cassidy has to wear her cast for about three weeks. Because Marissa's break was more severe, she has to wear her cast for six weeks.

Tami Wiese said once the pain stopped, the girls quickly began to see the some of the perks of wearing casts.

"You can't believe how much attention they get," Tami Wiese said. "And they love every bit of it."
 
Twins peak - the mystery

By Miranda Wood, Health Reporter
June 13, 2004
The Sun-Herald



Most doctors have an answer for everything but at Sydney's Royal Hospital for Women they are at a loss to explain the latest medical marvel.

Within a two-week period, 11 sets of twins were born - nine boy/girl sets and two girl sets - leaving the experts stumped.

The hospital's director of newborn care, Kei Lui, said he had never encountered such a high number of twin births since he started treating babies 20 years ago.

"Something very strange happened and we can't understand why," he said.

"It is very unusual. There could have been something in the water nine months ago."

Twins accounted for 60 per cent of all babies in the hospital's newborn nursery at the start of this month, up about 40 per cent on the average.

"It's never been at that percentage," Dr Lui said. The busiest period at the hospital was from June 3 to June 5 when five sets of twins were born.

Normally between one and two sets of twins are delivered at the hospital each week.

A woman's age, or assisted reproductive technology, normally increases the chances of having twins. But Dr Lui said they weren't the main factors that caused the hospital's twins boom.
Advertisement

Advertisement

"This is certainly not explained by IVF," he said. The twin rate in Australia had been increasing each year because women were leaving childbirth until much later.

Dr Lui said women aged over 30 naturally had a greater chance of producing twins but doctors were still unsure why this happened.

"As the maternal age increases, the multiple birth rate increases," he said.

Fertility treatments, including in vitro fertilisation, had contributed also to the growing twin rate, with more than 20 per cent of women who used artificial technology giving birth to twins.

Latest figures showed 1375 sets of twins were born in NSW in 2002, with the number of multiple births increasing by about one-third over the past 10 years.

Researchers at the Australian Twin Registry in Melbourne estimate that one in 80 births in Australia will result in twins.

New parents Peter and Monika Dydusiak were keeping their fingers crossed for twins.

"I'm a twin," Mrs Dydusiak said.

The couple from Maroubra welcomed their son Konrad and daughter Julia on May 20 - the first set of twins to be born during the hospital's spate of multiple births.

First-time mother Natalie Xylas, 29, said she wasn't surprised when she learned she was pregnant with her children - Evan and Victoria.

"I was on ovulation induction, which is like a hormone injection, so we knew the odds of having twins were quite high," she said.

"We were just so happy to be pregnant, we didn't mind."

When a woman has twins, she has a one in 20 chance of having twins again.

Twins can either be identical (single egg fertilised by a single sperm), in which case the babies are always the same sex, or fraternal (two different eggs fertilised by two different sperm). Half of all fraternal twins are boy-girl pairs.
Click to expand...

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/06/12/1086749942681.html?oneclick=true
 
From this week's New Scientist
Industrial pollution may double twin births
11:30_25_May_04
NewScientist.com news service

High levels of environmental pollution may increase the rate of twin births, suggests a new study.

Industrial pollution from a toxic waste incinerator more than doubled the proportion of twins born to mothers living nearby, compared with those living in away from pollution in the Hesse region of Germany.

"The mothers of children in very polluted areas have had more twin births," says Nadia Obi-Osius, one of the team at the Ministry of Environment and Health and the Institute for Medical Biometry and Epidemiology in Hamburg, Germany.

In their first analysis, the team examined births only among women who had not had fertility treatment. This was to ensure that the high rates of multiple births that often follow in-vitro fertilisation did not obscure other influences.

Obi-Osius and her colleagues believe the link between twins and pollution may reflect exposure to environmental factors which could also have other health effects. These could include effects on regulatory hormones such as thyroid hormones or developmental and behavioural retardation, she told New Scientist.

Inversion layer

The researchers investigated the effects after worried locals approached Wilfried Karmaus, one of the team, with health concerns over expansion plans for the toxic waste incinerator.

The incinerator burns heavy metals and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and is situated in the east Rhine valley. The valley is bordered by low mountains on both sides. "The region frequently has an inversion layer so the air pollution remains in the valley," the team notes.

They interviewed 671 mothers of schoolchildren aged 7 to 10 on their reproductive history. In the area close to the incinerator, 5.3 per cent of births were twin births. This compared to only 1.6 and 2.3 per cent of births in the low-pollution control areas.

Official registry data also confirmed the link. The birth records of over 20,000 children showed areas surrounding the incinerator and other industries had 1.4 to 1.6 twin births per 100 births, compared with 0.8 per 100 in other areas.

Obi-Osius says the reasons for the rise in twins in polluted areas is unclear. "We don't really know," she says. "This is one of the first studies which has found this connection."

Journal reference: Occupational and Environmental Medicine (vol 61, p 482)
Click to expand...

Wonder if it may be related to the Sydney result. Sydney does face increased pollution problems, which, combined with mothers delaying having children, might cause the upsurge in twins.

Just a thought.
 
A couple of thoughts about twins:

It is slightly disturbing to me to think of the placenta, which is in fact our unlucky genetic twin. Every cell in the placenta contains an exact copy of our DNA. At a very early stage (maybe someone can fill in the details) the little clump of cells that will eventually result in a human must differentiate. One section goes on to form the human, whilst the unfortunate other half goes on to form the placenta, which in a way is more than an organ, it's almost a creature in its own right.

Whilst we are born kicking and struggling into the loving embrace of our mothers, our tragic twin is dumped into a bucket and disposed of without ceremony.

On cases of clustering of twins in any given area, I don't think that it is likely to be significant. All random scatterings contain clusters. Like if you throw a handfull of rice onto a large map of the world, whereby every grain represents a set of twins, or a cancer victim or someone experiencing a paranormal event, you will find that, whilst the overall distribution is random, there will be a few clusters.

When this happens in real life, the people affected, i.e., those involved in or witnessing a cluster, lack the total overview and tend to think of the cluster as a significant event. They will then tend to look for environmental changes or events that seem to correlate with the formation of the cluster. In the middle ages they may have spotted an apparent correlation between a recent dispute with an old lady neighbour and a sudden clustering of cow sickness, whereupon the old lady would be deemed a witch. These days it may be that a cluster of leukemia cases seems to correlate with the placement of a new radio mast, which would lead to calls for the removal of the mast.

Clusters of twins such as those in India may be no more significant than this.

But then again ... who the Christ am I to judge?
 
The front page had a link to the Ananova version:

http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_992426.html

but it does appear to have separate confirmation (and a picture) so in it goes:

Twins' unlucky break

John Scheerhout

TWINS Elliott and Mitchell Cocks always do everything together, but the two-year-old toddlers from Sale Moor took their bond to extremes when they each broke their left arms on the same day - in separate accidents.

Mitchell got his fracture without even knowing when he fell off a slide and banged his head in the back garden of the family's Hoylake Road home.

He was treated in hospital for the bump on the head parents Christopher and Sarah tipped the slide in the garden onto its side so no one else could fall off it.

Common

But the same night, Elliott tripped over it and broke his arm. He was given a temporary cast and returned to Wythenshawe Hospital the following day - with Mitchell at his side.

He complained of pain in his arm and it was only then doctors realised both of them had broken left arms.

Sarah said: "The nurse told us it was common for twins to feel each other's pain, so we were expecting Mitchell's x-ray to come back clear.

"When we found he had broken the same arm, we could hardly believe it."
Click to expand...

http://www.manchesteronline.co.uk/news/s/121/121480_twins_unlucky_break.html

Emps
 
my only (very banal) encounter with "twin telepathy" was when my Aunt and her identical twin (who live quite far apart) turned up to a wedding in dresses that were almost identical but inverted (one was light on dark blue, and vice versa) without conspiring.
 
At the school I go to there are twins who I see quite often as they are in the same major as me. I have never ever seen one of them without the other and I have never seen them talking to anyone else without being made to by a teacher. I've always found it kind of creepy.
 
Steve Jefferson: "One section goes on to form the human, whilst the unfortunate other half goes on to form the placenta, which in a way is more than an organ, it's almost a creature in its own right."


I've always treated mine as a member of the family. True, he's no good at sports and the
piano lessons were a waste of money but he's sitting on my shoulder right now, looking out of
the window and enjoying his own quiet life.

He ain't heavy, he's my placenta. :p
 
Rainyocean's post just reminded me of something! According to a teacher, there were once twins at my school who refused to talk to anyone apart from each other, and they conducted their conversations in a made up language. They completely ignored anybody elses existence.
 
OH, I KNOW, it reminds me of that movie "Village of the Damned" (shudder)
 
I don't remember the placenta in Village of the Damned.

Or did you mean that other thing?
 
Twin gives birth to 2 sets of twins

Sunday, August 15, 2004 Posted: 0636 GMT (1436 HKT)


WYNNEWOOD, Pennsylvania (AP) -- The odds of a fraternal twin giving birth to two sets of identical twins may be one in a million, but Geana Morris can attest to it.

She delivered the quadruplets -- two boys and two girls -- on her 34th birthday at Lankenau Hospital. Mom and babies were doing well, hospital officials said Friday.

"It's a very special 'birth' day for me," said Morris, herself a fraternal twin.

Morris was implanted with two embryos in January, with the hope of carrying one to term. She and her husband, Kurt, also have a 2-year-old son.

Dr. Andrew Gerson, who delivered the babies, put the odds of such an occurrence at about one in 1 million quadruplet births.

Each of the newborns weighed between 2 and 3 pounds. Doctors hope the babies, who are receiving some help breathing, can be sent to their suburban Philadelphia home by the end of September, about a month before their mother's due date.
Click to expand...

http://edition.cnn.com/2004/HEALTH/08/14/twin.twins/index.html
 
Avondrow said:
I'd heard of this kind of 'parallel thinking' between twins, but never observed it before. It was quite remarkable to behold.
Click to expand...

My sister and I aren't twins - in fact, we're a year & a half apart (I'm younger) and we have another sister who's 3 years older than me.

My middle sister and I were always very close. By the time we were at the end of high school/beginning of college, we had something like that parallel thinking. For example, she'd walk into my room and say, "Can I borrow that shirt - " and before she could say which one, I'd pull it out. I don't know how I knew. Another example: she was dropping me off on my college campus and said, "OK, we'll meet at that spot?" I said yes and her fiance (now husband) just about went through the roof - "How do you guys know you're thinking of the same spot?" But we just laughed at him.

The best example of all is when we were at a party playing Pictionary. We were on different teams, and the way we were playing was that each team went off on their own drawing each picture and the first team to have someone guess would win. My sister and I happened to be drawing at the same time, and with our backs to each other, but we always drew the same picture!

We called ourselves "Siamese Twins joined at the mind" (- of course, now I would not use that term, "Siamese Twins," but rather "Conjoined.." )

But once we'd lived on our own, and she'd been married, for a while, we lost this ability completely. I seem to have developed it to some degree with my housemate (of 7 years) now, though...

I'll bet this sort of thing could account for some of the "parallel thinking" among twins - since it seems to grow out of similar and shared experiences, and twins growing up would share more of their experiences than ordinary siblings. Add to that the genetic identity, so to the degree that any thinking or behavior or preferences has a genetic basis, twins would have the same biological influences (more or less)...
 
Yeah, but what about those twins who were seperated at birth, yet got married on the same day, had a kid with the same name, etc...

Your story is very interesting though. Especially the part with the pictionary. I wish I could do that.:D
 
Yeah, that's why I said "some"... for the rest I'd still try to look for/rule out some biological explanation. We still don't quite understand how our genes affect, limit, etc. our behavior.

I've seen examples on TV of some of those separated-at-birth twins leading nearly identical lives - it is pretty bizarre!
 
Article published Wednesday, August 25, 2004

Rossford kindergarten sees double - 9 times

By MEREDITH HEAGNEY
BLADE STAFF WRITER


First-day jitters won't be a problem for 18 Rossford kindergartners this week. They'll start school with one surefire pal already in place, a friend they've known all their five years of life.

Their twin.

Nine sets of twins start kindergarten today and tomorrow in the Rossford Exempted Village School District. "It's amazing; we are just stunned," Superintendent Luci Gernot said. "It's an unusual event. Sometimes we don't follow the law of averages, I suppose."

The number of Rossford twins seriously distorts the law of averages. Only 2.8 percent of births in 1998 resulted in twins, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. Yet more than 8 percent of the district's approximate 220 kindergartners, most of them born in 1998, are twins. Both the number of kindergartners and twins are Rossford records.

"I was really surprised," said Howard Jones, father of Madalyn and Natalie. "It's going to be an interesting school year."

They will be among the first class of kindergarten students in the district to go all day after the board of education decided to end half-day kindergarten to help meet state academic standards.

Rossford's implementation of all-day kindergarten adds it to a growing list of area districts that have made the change, including Toledo, Perrysburg, Washington Local, Springfield Local, Gorham-Fayette, Pike-Delta-York, Evergreen, Archbold and Mason Consolidated schools. Bowling Green schools offer it in two of six elementaries.

But none of those schools has nine sets of kindergarten twins, a phenomenon some think is representative of a national trend. "It seems like there's a lot more multiple births now than there used to be," said Holly Schmidbauer, principal of Indian Hills Elementary School.

One reason is an increase in fertility therapies, said Dr. Joseph Karnitis, founder of the Fertility Center of Northwest Ohio, which is in Toledo Hospital.

In the past 10 years, hundreds of Dr. Karnitis' patients have given birth to twins, including Becky and Joel Dauer. They endured 2 1/2 years of treatment, including pills, shots, and surgery, before they became parents to Tommy and Greta, who are new Rossford students this year.

MacKenzie and Madison Lang have their genes to thank. The girls have cousins, great-great uncles, and two grandmothers who are twins.

Mrs. Gernot hopes all the twins grow up in the city.

"We were all speculating, can you imagine graduation 12 years from now if they all stay with us?" she said.

Most of the parents said they will send their children to Rossford High School. Sally Pietrasz, mother of Jake and Ryan, thinks all the twins may provide an interesting social opportunity.

"I think they'll have a blast with it," she said. "I'll be interested to see if the sets all hang out with each other."

Some of them already do. Grant and Garrett Hughes know Tommy and Greta Dauer from preschool. Meagan and Mathew Sillman often play with Anyssa and Alijah Durden.

Many of them won't meet this year because the nine sets are divided among Eagle Point, Indian Hills, and Glenwood elementaries, as well as the transitional kindergartners who will be in the Bulldog Center. They'll get acquainted eventually, especially if all 18 students end up in Rossford's classes of 2017 and 2018.

"We get to make a bunch of new friends," said Madison Lang, who is going to Eagle Point Elementary. "But I know how to annoy them if they're mean."

The children aren't the only ones with opportunities to make new friends. Mrs. Pietrasz has met some of the other twins' parents already.

"It was kind of neat to meet the parents," she said. "It would be nice to be able to talk to someone else with the same experience."

That experience includes paying twice as much for clothes, school supplies, and school fees. Jamie Dukes, mother of Trent and Morgan, spent about 0 in supplies, buying extra to get the children through the year.

"It's double the work of everything," she said.

Another headache comes when parents of twins must decide whether to put the siblings in the same class or separate them. School officials encourage putting them with different teachers, but it's up to the parents.

"Most parents request [separating the children]. I think it's a good idea," said Kim Simmons, an Eagle Point kindergarten teacher.

"They're developing their own individuality and self-esteem."

The Durden children are in different classes, but their mother wishes they were together because they are African-Americans.

"Rossford is mostly white, there's always one black kid in the class," Shantell Durden said. "I wanted them to be together so they had each other."

Grant and Garrett Hughes will be in the same class at Indian Hills, and they look so much alike that their grandparents can't tell them apart. Their mother said they're learning how to trick adults into mixing them up.

"I assume after being around Grant and Garrett for about a month, I'll be able to tell just by characteristics of their personalities," teacher Jen Yoder said.

As for the possibility of being outwitted by 5-year-olds? "That's a welcome challenge."
Click to expand...

http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040825/NEWS08/408250314/-1/NEWS
 
Kerala village a twin wonder

Ramesh Babu
Thrissur, August 24




In Kerala's Kadavallur village, it is normal practice for relatives of an expectant mother to make arrangements for two cradles, two cots and two sets of layette. Why two, one may ask. The reason is simple: this tiny village 35 km north of Thrissur is home to more than 70 pairs of twins.

And the numbers rise each year. The Government high school here boasts of 18 twins.

Nobody has an answer to this unique phenomenon. And no serious study has been done to unravel the mystery. Even doctors are at a loss. "It is nothing but a miracle," one of them says.

But old-timers here have a different take on it. According to them, it is a blessing from Lord Ram. Just like Ram — who had twin boys, Lav and Kush — the villagers are blessed with twins. It may be noted that Kadavallur is home to one of Kerala's oldest shrines, the Sree Rama Swamy temple that was reportedly built by Bheema's son Ghatotkacha.

------------
But not everyone is taken in by the legend. "There is some genetic factor behind this," argues social activist PN Harikumar while lamenting that no agency has bothered to study the unique biological phenomena.

Unlike others, about 90 per cent of twins here are identical. At times, even mothers can't tell one from the other. They dress, walk and talk alike. And those praying for a balancing act aren't rewarded either. Among twins, a boy and a girl are extremely rare.

"In class, they get away with pranks. When I ask one brother, he says the other brother did it," says KK Balan, a teacher at the high school. "We are planning a twin meet this year," he adds.

"It is the best thing ever. I too would love to have twins," says AM Sheena, who is engaged to be married while her twin Shani is already married.
Click to expand...

http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/5922_968362,0015002200000085.htm
 
Fascinaitng but sad:

September 16, 2004

India's first 'vanishing twin' born in Bengal hospital

Tuesday September 14 2004 18:30 IST

PTI

KOLKATA: In a rare occurrence, a young mother here has given birth to what is medically termed as the 'vanishing twin', a freak delivery in which one of the twins appears to be painted on a translucent leaf-like sheath.

The rare medical wonder, not yet reported in India, was witnessed by medicos last Friday when 24-year-old Amita Dutta delivered twin babies - one healthy boy and another 'flat' lifeless form that looked more like a fossilised baby.

"This is really amazing...We had read about it in our medical books, but never heard anything like this being reported in the country," said Dr Swagata Mukherjee who assisted the normal delivery at the Howrah Jain hospital.

The medicos had documented a twin after three months of Amita's pregnancy through pre-natal ultrasonography.

"However, at nine months, we could hear just one of the twin hearts beat. That put us on alert," he said.

After the delivery, Mukherjee and Jayati Bardhan of the North Bank Diagnostic Centre scanned medical literature from across the world to find out that the occurrence, variously described as 'vanishing twin', 'twin embolisation syndrome' or Foetus Papiricus (leaf-like foetus), had not been reported from this part of the world.

Normally two sperms fertilising two ova give rise to two zygotes, which simultaneously grow in one sack inside the mother's womb to be born as twins called Dizygotic Monochorionic twins (two zygotes, one sack).

"But this incident was also rare in that the twins were Dizygotic Dichorionic (two zygotes developing in two sacks)," Mukherjee said.

Unaware of the medical importance of the case, Amita and husband Pradyut Dutta, residents of Salkia in Howrah, are happy that at least one of the twins was a normal healthy baby.

While the 'vanishing twin' has been preserved at the hospital for medical reference, the doctors are preparing a paper to report the rare case in a medical journal.
Click to expand...

Source
 
Hi

(changed the title due to ambiguity in original)

source:
------------------
http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2004-11-09-twins-mom_x.htm


quote:
------------------

56-year-old woman delivers twins
By Rita Rubin, USA TODAY

A New York woman who delivered twins by C-section Tuesday, three days before her 57th birthday, would not have been accepted at many infertility clinics because of her age.

Motivational speaker Aleta St. James, sister of Guardian Angels leader and radio talk show host Curtis Sliwa, is believed to be one of only a few women in the world older than 55 to deliver twins. Francesca (5 pounds, 12 ounces) and Gian (5 pounds, 3 ounces) are her first children.

St. James, who is single, became pregnant via in vitro fertilization with donor eggs and an ex-boyfriend's sperm, says her infertility doctor, Jane Miller. Miller says she transferred only two embryos — considered the optimal number for achieving a single-baby pregnancy — into St. James' uterus.

Women's fertility begins to decline around age 30 and drops dramatically after 40, which can require the use of donor eggs from a younger woman.

Many infertility clinics will not treat women older than 50 or 55. The American Society for Reproductive Medicine's Ethics Committee, which last visited the subject of postmenopausal motherhood in 1996, concluded: "Infertility should remain the natural characteristic of menopause," so "postmenopausal pregnancy should be discouraged."

Miller says she generally advises against women as old as St. James — her oldest patient ever — becoming pregnant. But St. James, whom she started treating at age 53, is in excellent condition and has a large support network, Miller says.

"I can't use chronological age," says Miller, director of North Hudson IVF in Englewood Cliffs, N.J. "My judgments are based on the medical findings and history of the patient."

In November 2002, Richard Paulson, an infertility specialist at the University of Southern California, reported in The Journal of the American Medical Association that women over 50 are just as likely to conceive and deliver a baby with donor eggs as younger women are.

Still, Paulson says, pregnant women older than 55 are more than twice as likely as younger women in their 50s to develop preeclampsia, a complication marked by high blood pressure and protein in the urine.

Although Paulson's fertility program has an age cutoff of 55, it reported in 1997 that one patient had delivered at age 63. She had told doctors she was 10 years younger than she actually was.

---------------------

endquote

Mal F
 
Wow!! Not sure i'd have the energy at that age, certainly not for twins. One's bad enough when you're in your late 20's.
Very brave (or foolish) lady....
 
Sort that one out!!!

UPDATED AT 2:01 AM EST Friday, Nov 12, 2004

Twins sharing a lover create paternity puzzle

By TU THANH HA
From Friday's Globe and Mail



Montreal — The good news for the Montreal man claiming paternity of his former girlfriend's five-year-old child is that the woman acknowledged having an affair with him.

The bad news is that she said paternity is uncertain because she also had sex with the man's identical twin at the time of conception.

”They weren't expecting that,” said Myriam Pamphile, a lawyer representing the twin brothers.

So which twin is the father?

The quandary is spelled out in a Montreal court case that blends family-law issues with questions about the limits of DNA testing.

With identical twins having similar DNA, ”there's a high risk that it is impossible to determine who the father is,” Mr. Justice Paul Jolin noted in a recent ruling.

Judge Jolin, of Quebec Superior Court, has so far asked only that the man seeking paternity rights undergo by Dec. 1 a DNA test to see if he could even claim possible paternity.

Ms. Pamphile said she could not find any legal precedents for the extraordinary court case.

The man and his twin brother initially refused to be tested. The man is not obliged to give a DNA sample, but that would weaken his claim. His lawyer said he didn't want to pay for the test. His brother is refusing as a matter of principle because he supports his twin and doesn't consider himself involved in the dispute.

The man wants his paternity recognized so he can have visits with the child, Ms. Pamphile said.

At one point, the woman was alternately intimate with both men in what Ms. Pamphile called a ”tripartite relationship.”

However, she said her clients contend that this three-way situation did not last and was no longer in effect at the time of the child's conception.

By then, Ms. Pamphile said, the woman was on intimate terms with just one of the brothers, the one now seeking paternity rights.

She said that the man was always known as the child's father, that he was present at the birth and that the child calls him ”Papa.”

”He contributed to the child's needs. He was giving money,” Ms. Pamphile said. ”The facts are that he was assuming the role of a father.”

After relations soured and he no longer had access, he filed for parental rights this summer. The mother responded that first there should be DNA tests to see if the brothers are identical twins.

The brothers consider themselves identical twins even though they have never been formally tested.

The other twin is now a married father. A person who has met the brother who is seeking paternity described him as a charming, good-looking young man.

Neither the woman nor her lawyer could be contacted. The identities of the parties cannot be revealed under Quebec law.

If the courts cannot sort out the child's parentage, it is unlikely that science could help.

Genetics researchers consulted Thursday say it is possible for identical twins to have slightly different DNA, owing to genetic mutations while the embryos are duplicating in the mother's womb at an early pregnancy stage.

However, such differences are not detected with standard testing and devising a special analysis would be prohibitively expensive.

The Montreal lab mandated by the court, PRO-ADN Diagnostic, says on its website that it charges 5 for legal paternity testing. It also charges 5 to establish if siblings are identical or fraternal twins.
Click to expand...

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20041112.wxtwins1112/BNStory/National/
 
Weird. Earlier tonight I accidently overheard a conversation where a girl was trying to decide whether or not to date a guy she had been seeing's identical twin brother.
 
You know, identical twins do often have completely different personalities. So it is possible that one might be in a quandry over dating one or the other. Or she might just be worried that she's getting involved with the twin for the wrong reasons.

This problem would never arise if it were a man and identical twin sisters. He'd just spend his time trying to work out how to get them to agree to a threesome.
 
And time for one of my Dad's favourite jokes:

-------------
Two guys are in the pub having a chat:

"So I'm dating this identical twin"

"Do worry you might kiss her twin by accident?"

"No he has a moustache"

-------------
Coat? No it would just slow me down.
 
Twin Sisters Deliver Sets of Twin Boys


Dec 14, 11:24 AM (ET)

ATLANTA (AP) - Two twin sisters are seeing double - or make that quadruple - after delivering two sets of twin boys Tuesday.

Twenty-one-year-olds Ashlee Spinks of Indianapolis and Andrea Springer of Conyers, Ga., delivered their boys by scheduled Caesarean sections Tuesday about an hour apart at Northside Hospital.

The women were six months pregnant when they found out they were both going to have twin boys due on the same date - Jan. 1, 2005.

Spinks came to Georgia several weeks ago to share the pregnancy with her sister, and Spinks' husband, Bert Means, flew into town Monday to join the birthing party.

The two couples said twins run in the families of all four parents, and that they did not use fertility drugs to conceive the babies.

Dr. Larry Matsumoto, a physician who specializes in high-risk pregnancies, said the chances of twin sisters being pregnant with twin boys due on the same date are probably one in a million.
Click to expand...

Source
 
Twins live 70 mirror-image years to die within hours of each

Greets

The Scotsman
Fri 17 Dec 2004

Twins live 70 mirror-image years to die within hours of each other

JIM MCBETH

BORN within minutes of each other 70 years ago, they were inseparable in life and, ultimately, united in death through the mystical bond that exists between twins.

Elinor Stewart, the "older" of the two, died unexpectedly in her sleep in the early hours of the morning.

Her sibling, Bruce Couper, who had been suffering from a life-threatening illness and had been in a coma for two weeks, was unaware his sister had died when he, too, died a few hours later.

Today and tomorrow, the families of the twins, whose lives displayed such remarkable synergy, will lay them to rest in separate funeral services.

But they will be reunited in the New Year when their ashes will be placed alongside their parents in a family lair.

The twins were born in Redlands hospital in Glasgow’s West End, as the only children of their parents, on 26 January, 1934.

And as they grew up in Bellahouston on the South Side of the city, they became members of the same choir, St Gabriel’s in Ibrox.

The twins worked in the same Clyde shipyard and when they married, they each had three children, in the same configuration - two boys and a girl.

Mrs Stewart’s husband, Alexander, was best man to her brother while Mr Couper was the best man to his sister’s husband.

In January this year, they celebrated their 70th birthday together.

Mrs Stewart, from Strathaven, Lanarkshire, died at 2am on Monday and Mr Couper, from Glasgow, died at 10am on the same day in the city’s Victoria Infirmary.

Mrs Stewart’s son, Stephen, 39, said: "Although we have lost both of them so soon together, we are wonderfully comforted by the nature of their passing which is, to us, beyond any explanation.

"In life, my mother was the first-born and she was the first to pass away, her death being sudden and unexpected.

"However, what is extremely strange is that Uncle Bruce had been ill for some time. We were emotionally gearing up to lose him especially after he spent the last two weeks in a diabetic coma.

"But when the telephone call came it was to tell us that Mum had died in the early hours of the morning."

Mrs Stewart’s shocked family were gathered in her home when, just a few hours afterwards, they received a second call informing them that Mr Couper had died without regaining consciousness. Mr Stewart added: "He, of course, would not have had any conscious knowledge of the passing of my mum.

"But it is almost as if he was hanging on and somehow he knew - by what means we will never explain - that it was time to let go.

"On closer examination, it does not seem a surprise that they should die together. They always enjoyed a unique closeness which has been expressed in their deaths.

"They both sang, both worked in the same place, both had three children - two boys and one girl. There is a wonderful symmetry to this."

Mr Couper leaves a widow, Audrey, their children, Brian, Adrian and Sharon, and their grandchildren, Angus, Tilly and Robyn.

His funeral service will be held today at 11:30am in the St Mungo Chapel of Linn Crematorium, on the South Side of Glasgow.

Mrs Stewart leaves her husband, Alexander, their three children, Alexis, Stephen and Michael and their grandchildren, Alistair, Duncan, Heather, Andrew, Christopher and Jamie.

Her funeral service will be tomorrow at 9:15am in Avondale Old Parish Church, Strathaven.

The Rev Alan Gibson, who will conduct Mrs Stewart’s service, said: "It is a remarkable story, but it is one I am familiar with.

"I have had some experience of twins and they appear to embrace each other with a sixth sense.

"It is often the case that when one twin dies after an illness the other passes away of what we usually describe as a broken heart.

"But the fact that Bruce passed away without any knowledge that Elinor had died makes the end of their lives truly remarkable.

"It is an amazing story."

The unique relationship which exists between twins is a well-documented phenomenon, according to Professor Sir Michael Rutter, of the Institute of Psychiatry, in London.

Sir Michael, who has conducted research in the field, said: "This is remarkably interesting story.

"Research has indicated that twins often experience a closeness which is greater than that between a normal brother and sister."
Click to expand...

http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=1438822004

mal
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top