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The no frills IVF treatment costing under £1,000

  • Ashley Pearson says that IVF is getting less invasive and less expensive
  • The new £1000 treatment will allow the NHS to fund more treatments
  • It’s 50% to 60% cheaper than a full stimulation cycle

By
Ashley Pearson


PUBLISHED:

06:34 EST, 17 March 2014

|
UPDATED:

10:48 EST, 17 March 2014

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comments

In a few weeks it will be Mother’s Day; a wonderful occasion to celebrate the women who do so much for us and the joy it is to have a child. 

At this time of year, my mind also goes to the many lovely and amazing women I know who are currently working very hard to become a Mother themselves.  

And so, in advance of this lovely occasion, I would like to take this moment to encourage you.  In fact, there is lots of good news out there –and things are only getting better.

A new treatment coming to the UK is said to be just as effective as IVF but for a fraction of the price

First and foremost, IVF is getting less invasive and less expensive.

A ‘no frill’s treatment costing under £1,000 will be available to British women within weeks.

Despite its low-tech approach, a pilot study showed the treatment to be at least as effective as traditional IVF, and a hell of a lot less pricey.

Further in the good news category, Dr Geeta Nargund, of the Walking Egg foundation, who is bringing the procedure to Britain, believes it will allow the NHS to pay for more IVF treatments. Which is great news. 

And in terms of the risk to your health, many fertility clinics are now offering a ‘kinder, gentler’ IVF.Known as ‘minimal stimulation’ IVF, it uses fewer, and milder drugs and requires less frequent trips to the Doctor’s Office.

It’s also something like 50% to 60% cheaper than a full stimulation cycle. It uses milder injectables, oral drugs or a combination of both. 

This Mother’s Day, Ashley wants to remember all the women who are still trying to have a baby

You get fewer eggs each cycle, but it’s more patient-friendly, less costly and with lower risk to the patient; experts say it’s a great alternative for older women, who produce fewer eggs anyway in response to drugs, regardless of the dose.

And there are hundreds of really encouraging case studies.

In this week’s Wall Street Journal, real life mum-to be Neeburbunn Lewis, a 35-year-old nurse living in America, recounts how she spent around $25,000 for the single cycle of conventional IVF that produced her and her husband’s first child.

When the couple wanted a second, ‘financially, going through another cycle was not feasible,’ she told the paper. 

She also experienced ovarian overstimulation that put her in the hospital when she went through IVF.

‘I could not put my body through that again,’ she said. She heard about minimal-stimulation IVF from her OB-GYN and did one cycle at the Maine location of Boston IVF.

Her cost this time: $5,000. She is currently eight months pregnant with her second child.

And whilst women in their 30s or 40s are frequently harangued about the odds of delivering a baby with birth defects, new research suggests that the opposite may be true in certain cases.

In the new research, second-trimester ultrasounds for more than 76,000 women showed that older mothers (35 and over) were 40 percent less likely to have a child with major congenital malformations.

And despite alarming headlines to the contrary, if you are contemplating IVF, the biggest comparative study of its type in the world just found that young adults who were conceived through IVF have similar health patterns and success at school as those who were conceived naturally.

And be assured, new advances mean you may not have to go through IVF at all. There are currently advances in fertility acupuncture, diet and lifestyle research that can all work together to help you conceive.

Fertilty Expert Emma Cannon who runs London’s Fertility Rooms and is author of Total Fertility sees many of her fertility acupuncture patients become pregnant.

She has had great success with an integrated approach – looking at diet, acupuncture, lifestyle, even happiness levels, and the effect that they have on fertility. She was the woman I went to who offered me hope and positive thinking at a time when it was much needed.

‘Things are looking good for couples wanting to have a baby; IVF is improving all the time and there are more options available to (hopefully) reduce the amount of IVF cycles couples do.’

This new method of IVF is said to be far less invasive than current treatments available

The Baby-Making Bible author adds, ‘The endometrial scratch, prior to transfer, is a relatively non invasive procedure and IMSI is  a non-invasive method for selecting the best sperm: both show promise. We are seeing over 100 couples every year looking for lifestyle or acupuncture  support during or as preparation for  IVF. Many couples conceive naturally while waiting to start which is always a lovely surprise.’

And there are great advances being made in the field of male fertility as well. Clinical scientist Dr Sheryl Homa operates the only HFEA licensed UK fertility clinic dedicated entirely to men. (www.andrologysolutions.co.uk) 

She says: ‘Having worked in academia and then at IVF clinics, it struck me how marginalised the male side of things is.  In this country, 95 per cent of IVF clinics, (or more) are run by gynaecologists. And yet 50 per cent of the genetic material that makes up a baby is derived from the male. Why are we so obsessed with women and fertility?’

She help couples get pregnant without having to go down the IVF route. She cautions: ‘If faced with an unexplained infertility diagnosis- don’t go straight to IVF. Infertility is unexplained in around 25 per cent of cases.

‘However, there is now good evidence to suggest that sperm DNA damage and oxidative stress in semen may be significant factors contributing to unexplained infertility cases – and the good news is that there are now tests available to assess both of these factors.’

Diet, acupuncture, lifestyle, and even happiness levels, can affect fertility success.

Medical Director at the Poundbury Clinic and at King Edward VII Hospital Central London and in Dorset, Michael Dooley concurs that there is reason to be optimistic for women trying to become pregnant. 

‘The techniques that we’ve been doing are getting better, and by using an integrated approach, addressing lifestyle and relationships at the same time, we are getting higher rates of success.’

The Consultant Gynaecologist adds, ‘Solid evidence-based good help is available and success is improving. We have seen advances in egg storage for younger women who are thinking of delaying pregnancy, and egg donation is becoming more available and more acceptable.  We also have more information about how to improve success rates of embryo and egg freezing.’

Reproductive Endocrinologist David Sable recently wrote, speaking about IVF: ‘I dislike the way the term “miracle” (as in “miracle baby” or “miracle procedure”) is used…What happens when a cycle fails and a patient thinks,”Maybe I don’t deserve the miracle?”

‘If a patient believes that the outcome of an IVF cycle is a miracle, and is therefore not based in very real and very limiting probabilities, then she is going to very naturally feel that the outcome will reflect whether she is worthy of such a miracle or not….The truth is, when IVF fails a patient, IVF has failed. Not the patient.’

If you are someone who desperately wants to become a mother this year, at the very least, know that you are not alone. There are thousands of other women who are right there in the fight along with you, or the rest of us who stand beside you in solidarity; there is hope. 

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Comments (42)

what you think

The comments below have been moderated in advance.

a1111an,

bristol, United Kingdom,

20 minutes ago

This is going to encourage a gayby freakshow.

Lin,

Bromley,

51 minutes ago

I am not sure how frilly, IVF can be, but those that want it, should pay for it, as it’s not essential for their health.

Reggie,

London, United Kingdom,

1 hour ago

Gina, Middlesex, United Kingdom, 3 hours ago
We don’t need this. I am sorry but if you can’t have kids it is natures way of trying to control the population.
You wouldn’t be saying this if you couldn’t have kids. And I doubt if your family member was needing ivf you’d dare to say this to their face either. Nature didn’t invent the Mail Online either by the way so maybe you shouldn’t post on here.

stinkeye ferret,

londinium, United Kingdom,

1 hour ago

these doctors should stop playing god! if you cant have kids THE NORMAL NATURAL WAY then adopt or buy a dog! all this messing with nature will come back to haunt the human race!

Magda,

Paris, France,

1 hour ago

Oh, fantastic! Now we are going to be 8-10 billion in next to no time.

lura,

London, United Kingdom,

1 hour ago

Lets face it – the reason most women struggle to conceive is because they wait too long, which is a lifestyle choice. The NHS should not pay a penny to anyone over the age of 35 who are finding it difficult to conceive. Cancer victims, or those with conditions like polycystic ovaries, or other gynocological conditions, the NHS should help, because it is a medical issue. Waiting too long is not – its nature.

PieinSky,

England, United Kingdom,

27 minutes ago

I think to say women over 35 shouldn’t get help they might have been trying for a while as the NHS wont fund you unless you have been trying for 2 years. and you might not have met the right man or it might not be the right point in their life for many reasons I feel that is harsh. I am not over 35 but feel age isn’t a focus it might not be because of the lady it might be the man. Until you have experienced the shock you can’t understand the mental exhaustion on a lady going through this life changing experience.

lura,

London, United Kingdom,

1 hour ago

Fine, as long as you are paying the £1000, and all the drugs, yourself. And the NHS should not have to fund any of the cancers which come as a result of filling your body with hormones, either.

PieinSky,

England, United Kingdom,

1 hour ago

I have recently had 3 IUI and am going on to get IVF on the NHS they fund one free then I will have to pay which I find fair. There rule is you only get funding if you havn’t got a child. I also think this is fair. What I can’t understand is why you think people should automatically pay so much when if you are sucessfull you have to be able to afford the child if you spend all your money trying to get a baby how can you afford all the other expensive items to look after the child. I luckily have been saving for a child now for coming 4 years so will be able to afford a few treatments but not everyone has that luxury and I hope they get some chances like I have on the NHS. Good Luck to all you mums out there dreaming of their day.

Geoffrey,

Newcastle, United Kingdom,

2 hours ago

Immigration and adoption instead of ivf is the way forward. Indeed a high percentage of children born through ivf are susceptible to a number of debilitating and painful diseases. That doesn’t sound like good parenting to me but there again this is the UK.

deekini,

Haywards Heath, United Kingdom,

2 hours ago

The success rate of “low Cost” IVf is same as elective single embryo transfer(ESET). The biggest disadvantage is that because the number of eggs recovered are less thereby number of embryos, one does not have embryos to freeze. It is fine if one is getting a free cycle under NHS success rate as low as 20% is acceptable. But if one is paying then a optomal stimulation and good number of eggs and embryos leaves quite a few to be frozen. In our experience frozen /thawed embryos gives us 22-25% pregnancy rate.
Getting a pregnancy and having a baby is a Miracle as even the cleverest docytor cannot promise a pregnancy to his patients!

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