# Children concieved with the help of infertility treatments...



## Topkat08 (Jul 23, 2008)

Just thought i'd share this article i found with everyone else as i personally have never heard this in all my life!!

http://www.naturalnews.com/020905.html

Take care ladies x
/links


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## caz24 (Nov 25, 2004)

Ive never heard this before either?! 


caz x


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## professor waffle (Apr 23, 2005)

Blimey! I can honestly say I haven't heard of anyone who has had this happen to them. When you take into account that maybe women try naturally for a while & then when older (where the risks are greater anyway) try IVF. But that's just a blanket assumption & those ttc aren't all older mums. I dunno but I would hesitate to say that struggling to coincieve naturally means you'll have a child with problems in the future


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## *Bev* (Dec 20, 2005)

I'd love to look at the actual findings of this information, information published in this way is SO annoying and potentially damaging, you can't write a single page article to cover such a topic....  

Bev xx


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## Charlies-Mum (May 25, 2005)

Ok so I've read some of the research behind this - frankly having a child concieved through fertility treatment will "overall" increase your chance of birth defect (serious or otherwise) from 1% to about 1.5%, however there are several factors to consider

1) The average age of those having fertility treatment is older. Birth defects increase in prevailance as mothers (and fathers) get older. Eggs are more prone to chromosomal abnormalies. Its natural.

2) There is often an underlieing genetic cause as to why natural conception is not possible (weak or misformed sperm, uterene blood flow issues, maternal genetic factors, thelist goes on)

3) Fertility treatment often resutls in multiple pregnancies which are naturally higher in birth defects.

4) IVF pregnancies (and other fertility pregnancies) are usually monitored a lot closer than 'natural' pregancies, offering more chance for 'minor' issues to be spotted that would naturally resolve themselves without intervention.

Overall though the chance of a serious birth defect is still less than 1%. This takes into account the 'false positives' where something is thought to be wrong, but often proved otherwise.

Most pregnancies go on to produce healthy babies and we must keep that in mind before we stress out. Stay


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## Betty M (Dec 6, 2005)

There has been new research recently which shows that it is not IVF that is the issue but the reasons for the infertility in the first place - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7534720.stm

There are various risks associated with IVF (although see above) detailed in the Royal College of Obs & Gynae paper on "perinatal risks associated with ivf" - be warned though it is not aimed at a pregnant person so could just cause worry: http://www.rcog.org.uk/index.asp?pageID=1883 .

the risk is really small though so don't fret as the others have said.

Betty


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## Lesley08 (May 4, 2008)

Have to say this makes sense to me. I have often felt that my Dh and I are pushing for something which is being naturally prevented because there is a problem. It does depend on what that problem is however and in some cases I would assume there is no potential impact on any embryo's however in other cases such as with high numbers of abnormal sperm there is a chance of birth defects. This sounds like common sense, however I also think we need to be realistic in that the number of babies born with birth defects ( ranging from the very minor to the severe ) is quite higheven without fertility problems. conception is such a complex process and there is just so much we dont know about it yet. i feel we probably havent even got into male factor impact yet due to years of medical and scientific prejudice against women and a tendency to only really consider female factors!

Lesley xx


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