Disgusted with IVF Charging.

ER...but the figures below are for ALL IVF treatment.

These figures are per treatment cycle started (ie each attempt not complete course of attempts), pie and are for all ages. Agree that this sheet doesn't show the cumulative figures. The NICE site does though as do some others. The point is that the clinical recommendation is not to have just one attempt, but will be to have 3 attempts (equally couples without fertility problems shouldn't have sex only once if they want to conceive).

IVF really is fairly successful these days - though still not for everyone sadly, but it is currently geared to ability to pay...

Read this - skimmed most of it, but something stands out to me.

I think anyone who has tried to use the NHS for anything other than an acute condiiton will have discovered that it is quite frankly crap. It is so bad that it effectively doesn't function. Nice idea but it doesn't work. You've all heard me moaning on enough about the total lack of SALT my son has recieved0- despite still being non-verbal at the age of 4 and a hlaf. Actually the ironic thing is if he could speak then he would more than likely get SALT. It's becuase he's "too difficult" to treat that they don't bother, and we have to pay for weekly provate SALT. If we were on wefare in the States I believe he would have recieved SALT at least twice a week for last couple of years (JJ? is this right??) If you are difficult to treat, whatever it is that you may need, you will not get the service you require on the NHS. I would imagine infertility hits this problem- it's hard to treat.

As someone who has spent the last 2 and a half years battling with the HA, and got absolutely nowhere, so instead has gone private (what are credit cards for after all?) I say scrap it and start again with a sensible system which provides good free care to those who can't afford to pay for it, and provides good cheap care to those who can afford to contribute some or all of the cost.

Hmmm...not sure I worded that correctly. 21% of IVF treatments in that period resulted in a live birth, irrespective of how many treatments a couple had (including several), 1 in 5 is how it averages out national during that time frame. Your local hospital sounds pretty good given that.

150...I got it here and as no one can say how many tries a couple will have whether it be 1 or 20, for whatever reason the statistic relflects National live births total for all ages = 1 in 5 (21%)

Pie, where on earth did you get "only 1 in 5 couples who seek IVF, private or NHS will have any sucess" from? In the UK the average success rate for each IVF ATTEMPT is 1 in 5. So of course not everyone conceives on their first attempt - but the stats for my local hospital showed that over 50% of couples had a baby after 3 attempts, and looking at the first 6 attempts over 87% of couples had a baby. With any fertility treatment you don't just try for one month. Some women do give up after a number of treatments due to either cost or not being able to cope with the treatment. Also the research that has been done seems to suggest that for most couples the chances of conception remain the same regardless of how many attempts that they have - it remains a 1 in 5 chance each cycle.

The "why don't you adopt?" line is a very difficult one, and I'm not sure that this is a thread for that debate. If nothing else you will not be considered for adoption until you have stopped all fertility treatment - I think my local authority wouldn't even start the home studies etc until you had had no treatment for a year. Once you apply for adoption it will be made very clear to you that this is not just an alternative to normal parenthood - the challenges are quite different. I think that in previous generations these challenges were different ie when you could adopt a baby from birth, but a lot of the children looking for homes have special needs and have quite a lot of history to deal with. This of course doesn't mean that they should have good homes - just that it does mean that they shouldn't automatically be handed to couples who haven't got kids of their own. If anything adoption agencies are desparate for couples who do have some experience in parenting.

With IVF we are looking at a failry successful treatment - bear in mind that the NICE guidance is likely to say that 3 IVF attempts should be offered to all applicable couples where the woman is aged 23-39.

The comparisons to cancer have been unhelpful.

How about using some of the Viagra bill to help fund IVF instead?

I think everyone deserves a chance to IVF, not only people who can afford it.
What about people who are infertile because of an illness (like cancer)? What about a mother who has lost a child and whose only chance for another child is IVF? What about someone who is severely depressed, whose marriage is cracking under the pressure, and who can't stand to see mothers walking down the street with their children because it reminds them about their longing for a child? Perhaps IVF won't work and they eventually have to realise that they won't have their own child. However, I understand why people want to try all options and I think it is very unfair to just expect them to accept that this is "mother nature" and that they can just adopt a child. Personally I didn't just want a child. I wanted my own child. My husband's child. I think that's the same for most of us.

Twinkie, I just know that many couples who struggle for their own child find it very upsetting always to be told that they can always adopt. And it is very easy to use your Lemon-saying if you are not dealt lemons!

Message withdrawn

hear, hear, aloha.

Quite, Pie.

Considering only 1 in 5 couples who seek IVF, private or NHS will have any sucess, it would seem to me that many couples would have to start thinking of either remaining childless or into adoption/fostering. So why is it so bad to suggest it Fairymum when the odds are so stacked against sucessful IVF? If IVF doesn't work don't you have to ask, do you want to reproduce or be a parent, as they aren't the same thing.

misdee, why have you not adopted on of thse "hundreds of kids" yourself? Why have you taken up so much money on the NHS getting ante-natal care, the cost of your delivery and labour and perhaps also money for maternity leave from work when you could have adopted? What made you want your won child ? I think adoption can be great for many couples, but isn't the solution for all.
I think it's simplifying as well as misunderstading the issue of infertility to just think the problem is solved by passing childless couples someone else's child......

"My wife and I have been trying for a baby for around 3 years, at the moment she is taking Clomid to assist with Ovulation.

We are hopeful that the Clomid will be a sucsess, but we have been exploring all avenues. I stumbled across the HFEA website that lists all assisted conception units in the UK and I was shocked to see the NHS charging first time patients for IVF treatments.

Searching for some kind of campaign on the net was fruitless but through search engines I found many discussions on the matter and I was shocked to see the amount of hatred people have been spouting on various discussion boards about the cost of providing free IVF on the NHS for childless couples, they estimate the cost at £400m.

£1,500 seems to be the average cost (not including drugs) and for a childless couple, intially, this is a small price to pay as we are desperate to be parents but where does it stop?

I have even seen adverts from loan shaks offering IVF loans to desperate couples.

We could end up in extreme debt and still have no baby at the end of it.

Yet if I was to drink myself into oblivion and screw up my liver the treatment and operation would be free, hell, if I decided to have my gender "reassigned" I could even get a free sex-swap op on the NHS, smokers are offered free cessation assistance on the NHS and we all know that cancer treatments for smokers are also free.

Infertility in most cases is not self inflicted yet couples are forced into debt to pay for treatments - people who have made themselves ill through stupidity are treated free.

The estimated £400m cost is a small price for the goverment as IVF children grow up to be taxpayers.

Its time to End the postcode lottery now."

the reason i just copied and pasted this is so we can be reminded of the original message.

there shoulodnt be a postcode lottery on ANY medical treatment. but there is, and local hospitals and specialist units are being shut due to under-funding. a local hospital spent years funsraising to get the uk first 'results while u wait' breast cancer screeninmg unit up and running, so far (as far as i am aware anyway) it still isnt open. hospitals are over stretched, u can spend a whole day down a+e trying to see a doc when u are seriously ill. my dh went to hospital last week, to be told to go to his gp, who in turn sent him straight bck to a+e for treatment, where he should have spent the night on a ward, but they could only get him a trolly bed in resus so he came home.

i really feel for people not able to have children, i'm lucky in the way i'm healthy and young and have been blessed with 2 beutiful daughters. but if i couldnt then i know it would hurt me emotionally, but there are hundreds of kids needing homes in this country.

Ok, I'm just reading this whole thread and thank you Tinker for making me spit my water all over the computer. NHS tourists....

(off to find a towel to clean things up)

WHO actually defines infertility as a illness! Not life treatening perhaps, but nevertheless a an illness. Of course, life treatening illnesses should always take priority. Does anyone think differently? I don't think so. However, if you have to compare (which I think is pointless) how do you decide what is important and what isn't?
My friend has been treated for PND and been on prozac for 2 years on the NHS. Is her depression more important to treat than years of depression caused by infertility?

There is no need to be so aggressive, pop.

I think we did all understand your post perfectly well - if you don't think your IVF treatment is more worthy than the other examples you gave, then why mention them? Why not just say that other life enhancing (rather than life saving) treatments are avilable on the NHS so why not IVF?

If you read the whole thread you'll also find that a lot of us found the reference to alcoholism offensive too.

I have to agree with M2T - excuse me, but where has anyone expressed hatred to you or your wife? Can you find me one example? I think in fact, that people have been remarkably forbearing given that you do have a tendancy to be aggressive and insulting - and to swear an awful lot, which doesn't help either.

And I'm sorry, but cancer and infertility was directly compared by Astrogirl: "Suffering from cancer and being unable to reproduce are both traumatic experiences. One is no more important than the other." And surely you can't be surprised that quite a few people honestly disagree with that.
And as Zebra has pointed out, according to the new NICE guidelines about to come in, you and your wife will probably have the chance of free IVF on the NHS very soon anyway, so you are getting terribly angry about something that is being changed anyway, no matter what anyone says.
I have close friends struggling with infertility and I do know how it dominates their lives and makes them very unhappy but they don't agree that it's worse that cancer. As I said, if Clomid doesn't work for them, they have been offered free NHS IVF, so what you are saying about it never being offered is simply untrue.
Re: Gender reassignment. The argument for NHS gender reassignment is precisely the same as for infertility treatment - that there is a very high rate of depression and an astronimical rate of suicides in those rare people who genuinely believe they are the wrong sex. This is why the treatment is offered. I have my doubts about it myself, but there does appear to be good scientific evidence that this belief has physical roots and that their brains are different - perhaps due to hormonal influences in the womb - hardly their fault.
Getting a liver if you are an alcoholic is, as I understand it, very unlikely. The vast majority simply die. And addiction is an illness too. I think attacking others who are ill is hardly a way to attract sympathy for your own cause.

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POP2005 - Please stop being so aggressive and dramatic! Noone hates you and your wife for wanting children!

Your attitude to others opinions is what the problem is. You said you experienced this reaction on many other discussion boards. Then perhaps YOU should re-evauluate how YOU are wording your posts. There have been discussions about this before here that hasn't resulted in a slanging match. Its your blind insults and off the cuff comments that seem to be riling people..... which I think you are well aware of.

If you want a discussion then HAVE ONE and stop attacking people.

There said it. Now lets all play nice.

Astrogirl, as JanH says lack of treatment would cause death, regardless of how the cancer was caused. So if your fertility treatment meant eating into the budget allocated to your mother's cancer treatment what would you do?

Comparing cancer (however the cause) to infertility is unlikely to make anyone more supportive to free IVF treatment when you start arguing that if you've 'given' yourself cancer your right to a child supersedes their right to life.

Suffering from cancer is much worse than infertility IMO. You can die from the former and not from the latter. And I actually support free IVF on the NHS (within limits). However, one of the reasons Paul Merton's wife refused conventional cancer treatment was because it would have made her infertile and she thought that was worse than death, so presumably there is someone who had both who genuinely thought that infertility was worse than cancer...

misdee - it is recommended but is optional (esp if they're not funded). I guess it is just in case you have a fall or something? Sorry off-topic, but the only time that I've encountered NICE in practice.

Back to the topic in hand, if you're paying for IVF on the NHS, then do check the success rates. I was very peeved having waited for NHS treatment to find out that for £500 more I could get tretament at a hospital with twice the success rate.

if my dh had to finance his own treatment he'd be dead.

astrogirl, if the cancer patient couldn't finance their own treatment they would die. Who decides which cancers are caused by lifestyle and which by chance?