[History of gynecologic treatment of infertility]

Within less than 20 years this branch of the infertility treatment by new reproductive medical technologies has left behind the original concept of bypassing blocked tubes. It has started to bypass nature. As the extracorporal way, however of shortest duration within the human prenatal development, exposes the human being to external influences, the discussion about the pros and cons of the new technologies is already abundant and still rising. The field named infertility-treatment was once in the middle and in the heart of the gynecologic discipline. It gave rise to the most intellectual branch of gynecology, the gynecologic endocrinology. Undoubtedly, there are tendencies at present to make "Reproductive Medicine" an independent discipline splitting from gynecology and obstetrics, with only the core remaining gynecology, but with the addition of essential constituents coming from genetics, human biology, andrology, medical ethics, even from sociology and law. Gynecology would tremendously suffer from this loss. The field "Reproductive Medicine" has gained the most attentive audience far beyond the scope of our gynecologic profession. One thinks it should have calm and peace to grow further in the same way other fields of medicine flourish, guided by science, concience and compassion. The juxta-medical expansion of the field could as well not have been foreseen one-hundred years ago.