Posts

Rewriting Fertility: A Conversation with Nidhi Panchmal

  Nidhi Panchmal is the pioneering co-founder of Arva Health , a company reimagining modern fertility care in India. As one of the few female leaders in India’s fertility tech space, she is disrupting the IVF landscape with a bold, empathetic, and patient-first approach. Q: So what exactly prompted you to start Arva? Was there a personal story behind it, or something that inspired you? A: I think I was around 25 at the time, right after COVID, and honestly, I had never really thought about my health much before then. I’d always been really fit. I was an athlete, so I assumed that meant I was healthy. But I never actually stopped to understand what my health looked like beyond that. And when you’re younger, it just doesn’t feel urgent. No one really tells you it should be. You’re not taught to take it seriously until it suddenly starts to matter. Around that time, my co-founder Deepalie, who’s also been a close friend since we were kids, and I kept getting asked the usual question...
3 comments
Read more

Continuing the Conversation: Dr Nalini Mahajan on Women’s Fertility and IVF

Q) How does preimplantation genetic testing (PGT-A, PGT-M) affect IVF success rates? A) Preimplantation genetic testing—so now, there are two types, as you’ve written: PGT-A and PGT-M. PGT-A is for aneuploidies, which are numerical chromosomal abnormalities that happen with age. Normally, you have a certain number of chromosomes: 22 pairs plus either XX or XY. If there’s a break or error—for example, an extra chromosome—it’s called a trisomy. If there’s one missing, like XO, it’s a monosomy. These abnormalities often lead to miscarriages. Since age increases the risk of these aneuploidies, if an older woman is going for IVF, we do advise, if possible, to test the embryos for these abnormalities. If you find a normal embryo, it will give you a better chance at success. PGT-M is for monogenic diseases. If there’s an inherited disorder in the family—say, a BRCA mutation—you can test for that using PGT-M. But for this, you must know the exact mutation—which gene, which chromosome, and wha...
4 comments
Read more

A Deep Dive into Fertility with Dr. Nalini Mahajan

Dr. Nalini Mahajan is an infertility specialist and gynaecologist with over 51 years of overall medical experience, including 45 years as a specialist. She holds an MBBS and an MD in Obstetrics and Gynaecology, and has spent more than 35 years working specifically in the field of infertility and assisted reproduction, both in clinical practice and academic settings. Q) Why does IVF need to be personalized, and what factors determine the best approach for each patient? A) The first and most important question is: Does the patient even need IVF? Before anything else, a thorough assessment is essential to determine whether IVF is the right course of action, because there are other fertility treatments that might be more suitable depending on the case. Once IVF is deemed necessary, personalisation becomes crucial because each patient is different. They may have different reasons for infertility—some may have female-factor infertility, others male-factor, and some both. For instance, if m...
4 comments
Read more