Lifestyle issues

You've probably heard a lot in the last week about the survey of fertility experts that showed they thought people's lifestyles should be taken into consideration when deciding whether they should have IVF. The survey, for the British Fertility Society, questioned about 200 experts in the field, and just 29% of them thought that treatment should be offered to all, regardless of their lifestyle. So anyone who couldn't get pregnant and was overweight, who drank or who smoked should beware...

It is true that all of these things can affect your chances of conceiving, but it is also true that many people who smoke, who are overweight and who drink get pregnant naturally without any trouble. No one in their right mind would smoke or drink to excess when they were pregnant, but it does seem that those of us who don't get pregnant easily are expected to turn into paragons of virtue in order for others to feel we should be allowed to try to have children. We shouldn't forget the immense stress of living through year after year of trying to conceive unsuccessfully, and perhaps should forgive rather than chastise those who end up succumbing to bad habits every now and again. And when it comes to weight, one of the most common causes of female infertility, polycystic ovary syndrome, makes it harder for women to lose weight.

When I wrote The Complete Guide to Female Fertility , I gave lots of advice on lifestyle changes you can make to try to maximise your chances of getting pregnant because I know that people want to do whatever they can. However, it is also important to recognise that making your life utterly miserable in order to have the best possible lifestyle for conception may be counterproductive.
Professor Bill Ledger , one of the country's leading fertility experts, gave an absolutely fascinating presentation on this at National Infertility Day, in which he explained how guilty fertility patients are made to feel about their lifestyles, and how this can cause stress, which is known to damage fertility. It was a refreshing look at the subject, as all too often we end up feeling we are to blame for our fertility problems. Of course you should try to give up smoking, of course you shouldn't drink too much, and if you are overweight you should try to lose some excess pounds, but if you don't reach your ideal weight, or get drunk at a party, or find yourself having the occasional sneaky cigarette, you shouldn't feel you've ruined your chances of ever being allowed to try to have a baby. Guilt, Professor Ledger told us, is the new black!

But getting back to the
British Fertility Society survey ... Apart from the stuff on lifestyle issues, one of the main findings was that most experts in the field wanted to see more research into new techniques used in IVF, such as immume therapy and PGS, and felt they were offered to patients too quickly before scientific trials had shown them to be effective. This is something patients would welcome, as it is impossible to know who to believe or what to trust when the evidence on these treatments is so scanty. From the patient perspective, perhaps the most reassuring finding of the survey was that the majority of the experts believed fertility treatment should be funded by the NHS - maybe one day we'll see the implementation of the government's own advisory body's recommendation of three funded cycles for those who need them...