Dr. Shang-Gwo Horng

About

Director of Reproductive Surgery is a description of what happens in the operating room, not a courtesy title. At NUWA Fertility Center the surgical management of infertility causes is organized as its own department, and Dr. Shang-Gwo Horng holds it, with laparoscopy and hysteroscopy both named as the operative routes and IVF, IUI and reproductive endocrinology named as the treatment side of the same practice. The clinical question that job answers is when to operate before a cycle, whether operating will improve the chance of pregnancy at all, and how long to wait afterwards.

The appointments behind that post run across three different kinds of institution in Taiwan. A medical-center teaching hospital: physician in the department of reproductive medicine at Chang Gung Memorial Hospital in Linkou, the largest of the Chang Gung system’s hospitals. A hospital-based fertility unit: director of the reproductive center at Hsinchu Cathay General Hospital. A dedicated fertility group: director of the infertility department at Taiwan IVF Group, an organization whose name signals the international patient work. Director and attending titles appear at all three levels, which means the case mix ranges from complex hospital referrals to a private fertility service’s scheduled cycle list.

Training follows the Chang Gung system: the Graduate Institute of Clinical Medical Sciences at Chang Gung University, a master’s oriented at clinical research rather than laboratory science, after the School of Medicine at Kaohsiung Medical University. The specialty list is narrow beside those of many fertility physicians, and its first two entries are unusual together: female infertility and male infertility named as separate items, so the couple is assessed as two patients rather than one. The clinic’s published cases under this physician include a patient from Macau with blocked fallopian tubes who conceived on the first transfer, and a PCOS patient who conceived twins through insemination.

Clinical Expertise

• Laparoscopy: operating through small abdominal incisions to treat endometriotic implants, ovarian cysts including endometriomas, tubal disease and pelvic adhesions, with the extent of dissection weighed against how much ovarian tissue is left for stimulation afterwards.
• Hysteroscopy: a camera passed through the cervix into the uterine cavity, used to deal with polyps, intrauterine adhesions and septa and to reshape the cavity before an embryo is placed.
• Sequencing surgery and treatment: endometriotic cysts, submucosal fibroids and cavity anomalies each have a different answer about whether surgery improves the odds, and the same physician decides the operation and the protocol that follows it.
• IVF: stimulation design, monitoring, retrieval and transfer, including the cases where surgery has already changed the ovarian picture.
• IUI: induced ovulation with prepared semen placed in the uterus, the tier used for ovulation disorders, mild male factor and unexplained infertility.
• Male and female infertility together: assessment covering ovulation, tubal patency and the uterine cavity on one side, and semen parameters and male reproductive function on the other, before deciding the intervention tier.
• Reproductive endocrinology: reading hormone results to explain an anovulatory or irregular cycle, then correcting what is adjustable before deciding whether the couple needs insemination, a retrieval cycle or operative treatment of a structural cause.

Why Choose Dr. Horng

Both operative routes are in one profile. Laparoscopy works from the abdominal side on the pelvis and the ovaries; hysteroscopy works from inside the uterine cavity. Infertility that involves both — an endometriotic ovary and a cavity with polyps, for example — usually means two decisions about timing, and having both instruments in the same set of hands removes a handoff.

A surgeon who also writes cycles. IVF and IUI appear on the same list as the two operations, so the question of whether an operation will actually raise the chance of pregnancy is answered by the person who then has to stimulate the patient afterwards. That is the discipline that keeps unnecessary surgery off a fertility plan.

Three institutional settings, at director level in two of them. Reproductive center director at Hsinchu Cathay General Hospital, infertility department director at Taiwan IVF Group, and attending physician at Chang Gung Memorial Hospital Linkou. Each setting filters cases differently: a medical center sees disease that complicates pregnancy, a hospital fertility unit sees the standard referral load, and a dedicated fertility group sees international patients on a schedule.

Male factor is part of the stated scope. Listing male infertility as a named specialty puts semen assessment and male reproductive function inside the same consultation as the female workup, instead of a route where a low count discovered at the fertility clinic sends the couple elsewhere to rebuild the history.

Difficulty cases the clinic documents. The patient stories published under this physician include a nine-obstacle conception journey through endometriotic cysts and ovarian failure that ended with two children, a 29-year-old with ovarian failure and irregular cycles who conceived through IVF, and a Macau patient with tubal blockage who conceived on the first transfer.

Professional Affiliations

Appointments: Director of Reproductive Surgery at NUWA Fertility Center; Director of the Department of Reproductive Center at Hsinchu Cathay General Hospital; Director of the Department of Infertility at Taiwan IVF Group; physician in the Department of Reproductive Medicine at Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Linkou. Education: master’s from the Graduate Institute of Clinical Medical Sciences at Chang Gung University, and the School of Medicine at Kaohsiung Medical University.

Two of the three employer names on that list belong to large institutional groups rather than standalone clinics, and the graduate institute posting and the Linkou appointment both sit under Chang Gung, which is the clinical research training behind the operative speciality.

Suitable For

Surgery needed before a cycle starts: cavity polyps, adhesions and septa reduce implantation, and endometriotic disease affects both egg recruitment and access to follicles. Whether either is worth operating on before stimulating is a single decision, and both operative routes are named here.

Couples with male factor infertility: when count, motility or morphology is part of the picture, the plan changes tier — insemination may still work at a mild deficit, not at a severe one. Male infertility appears as a named specialty rather than as something the female workup uncovers, so both partners are assessed in one place.

Planning treatment after cyst surgery: an operated ovary often has lower reserve than before, so the start date and the stimulation dose after surgery have to be re-derived from new test results. Endometriotic cysts and ovarian failure appear together in one of the clinic’s published stories under this physician.

Poor response or ovarian failure protocols: when stimulation recruits little, the choice is between changing protocol, accumulating over cycles, or changing route, and the surgical history of the pelvis bears on all three. One documented NUWA case is a 29-year-old with irregular cycles and ovarian failure who reached a pregnancy through IVF.

PCOS ovulation induction under monitoring: response to induction medication varies enough in this group that dose and timing are set scan by scan, with hyperstimulation risk carried alongside. The clinic’s stories include a PCOS patient who conceived twins via insemination.

One center for surgery and treatment: booking a hysteroscopic correction, an ovarian assessment and then a transfer at the same institution keeps the monitoring records in one file and shortens the interval between deciding and doing, which matters when ovarian reserve is the limiting factor.