A landmark in the development of fertility treatment was announced by doctors yesterday with the birth of the first babies to be conceived using a revolutionary technique that offers a safer, cheaper alternative to IVF.
The twin boy and girl, who were born on 18 October at the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford, were conceived using In Vitro Maturation (IVM), a method that dispenses with the use of costly fertility drugs, saving up to £1,500 on the normal price of treatment.
The technique is also safer for the one in three women among those seeking fertility treatment who have polycystic ovaries, a condition that puts them at high risk of dangerous side effects from fertility drugs.
Specialists said the development could make in vitro techniques available to more infertile couples by cutting the cost of treatment. Infertility is estimated to affect one in six couples in the UK but IVF costs around £5,000 a cycle and treatment is restricted on the NHS.
Tim Child, a consultant gynaecologist at the Oxford Fertility Clinic and senior fellow in reproductive medicine at Oxford University, who led the work, said: "I think it is a safer, cheaper alternative to IVF for all women. However, for many women the success rates are currently much lower. Research in the future will address this."
The Oxford Fertility Clinic is the only one in the UK licensed to use the technique where 20 cycles of treatment have been carried out and four other women are currently pregnant. This gives IVM a pregnancy rate of 25 per cent compared to a 45 per cent pregnancy rate using IVF. This is expected to improve with further experience.
The parents of the babies, who have asked to remain anonymous, were delighted, Mr Child said. At birth the boy, born first, weighed 6lb 11oz and the girl weighed 5lb 14oz.
In standard IVF, the woman takes fertility drugs for five weeks to stimulate production of her eggs, which are then collected direct from her ovaries under the guidance of ultrasound, before being fertilised in the laboratory. The drugs cost between £600 and £1,500, with charges often higher in London.
IVM avoids the use of drugs and instead involves collecting eggs from the ovaries while they are still immature. The eggs are then grown in the laboratory for 24 to 48 hours before being fertilised and replaced in the womb.
Mr Child said: "The main advantage is improved safety for women. Women with polycystic ovaries have a one in 10 chance of severe ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome. IVM completely takes away that risk. IVF is also expensive. With IVM the cost is reduced, meaning it could become a more accessible form of fertility treatment."
The technique was pioneered by the University of McGill in Montreal, Canada, where Mr Child spent two years researching and developing it before joining the University of Oxford in 2004. It has also been used in Seoul, South Korea, and Scandinavia. To date about 400 babies have been born worldwide using IVM compared with around two million by IVF.
At present the Oxford Fertility Clinic is only offering the treatment to women with polycystic ovaries, but in the long term Mr Child said he hoped to offer the procedure to all women. "We are not offering it to women with normal ovaries at present because we don't get enough eggs from them. On average we get four eggs from a woman with normal ovaries compared with 16 from one with polycystic ovaries. The procedure involves a process of attrition – two-thirds mature and two-thirds of those fertilise – so you need a decent number to start with."
A spokesman for the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority said IVF was expensive for most couples and a minority got treatment on the NHS. But it was too soon to tell whether IVM would replace IVF.
"Anything that reduces the cost of IVF, provided it is safe, means treatment could be available to more people. But this is an emerging technology – it is very early days."
By Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor
The Independent
