Georgeanna Seegar Jones

Georgeanna Seegar Jones (July 6, 1912 – March 26, 2005) was part of the husband and wife team which pioneered in vitro fertilization in the United States. Her husband was Dr. Howard Jones.

She was one of the United States' first reproductive endocrinologists. She was best known for her work with in vitro fertilization, but is also credited with numerous other discoveries, one of which allowed women with a history of miscarriages to carry their children full term. Dr. Jones authored several textbooks and more than 350 infertility research papers.^[1]

Birth

She was born July 6, 1912 in Baltimore, Maryland and obtained her B.A. from Goucher College and later her medical degree from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in 1936. She became the director of Johns Hopkins' Laboratory of Reproductive Physiology and was the Gynecologist-in-Charge of the hospital's gynecologic endocrinology clinic in 1939.^[1]

As a resident at Johns Hopkins, she discovered that the pregnancy hormone hCG was manufactured by the placenta, not the pituitary gland as originally thought. This discovery led to the development of many of the early over-the-counter pregnancy test kits currently available. Dr. Jones is also credited with using progesterone to treat women with a history of miscarriages, thus allowing many of them to not only conceive, but to deliver healthy babies.

In Vitro Fertilization (IVF)

She continued working in reproductive medicine until the 1970s, when Johns Hopkins enforced its mandatory retirement clause, forcing both Dr. Jones and her husband, Dr. Howard W. Jones, Jr., out of the hospital. The Drs. Jones moved to Norfolk to teach at the newly founded Eastern Virginia Medical School.

Shortly after their arrival in Virginia, the world was shocked by the announcement of the world's first in vitro fertilization birth in 1978 by a British team of doctors and scientists.

The Drs. Jones began work on the first IVF project in the United States, funded primarily by a $5000 grant. On December 28, 1981, their work culminated in the first US IVF birth; it was, importantly, the first to use controlled ovarian hyperstimulation. The birth of Elizabeth Jordan Carr, the first American "test tube baby" helped change the lives of many women who, prior to IVF were unable to conceive.

Controversies

The majority of the concerns regarding the work of Dr. Jones were with the IVF program itself. Some anti-abortion activists expressed concern that the IVF process created multiple embryos when only a few would be actually be utilized: the others would be frozen or destroyed.

Sources

• New York Times obituary
• The Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine website

References

1. ^ ^{a b} Biography at The Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine.

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Name	Jones, Georgeanna Seegar
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Date of birth	July 6, 1912
Place of birth
Date of death	March 26, 2005
Place of death