IVF treatments need to include a personalised and holistic approach, a world leader in reproductive health will say today.
Bart Fauser, professor of reproductive medicine at the University of Utrecht, The Netherlands, and Fellow ad eundem of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG), will tell delegates to the Fertility 2017 conference that all aspects – including the burden of treatment and cost for the families and society – needs to be examined.
At the Edinburgh event – the 10th joint conference of the UK Fertility Societies: the Association of Clinical Embryologists, the British Fertility Society and the Society for Reproduction & Fertility – he will offer an overview of the future of ovarian stimulation for infertility treatment.
He will discuss the different forms of ovarian stimulation, mainly treatment of infertility due to abnormal ovarian function, will question the complex and costly ovarian stimulation regimens that require multiple hospital visits and will examine the effects on patients.
“We need to look at IVF more from a holistic perspective,” he will tell delegates.
“At the end of the day, the outcome most relevant for the couple is what are the chances for a healthy child per treatment, which may include multiple cycles. And what is the burden of treatment and cost for the families and society.”
He will also discuss the studies that confirm the effectiveness of mild ovarian stimulation for IVF, in the context of reduced drug cost and burden of treatment, how individual variability can be observed in ovarian response to stimulation and the development of biomarkers to predict this.
“This concept should be developed further, but initial observations suggest that such markers can be used to individualise dosing of ovarian stimulation, representing an important step towards improved, patient tailored care in IVF,” he will say.
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