Having second thoughts about doing IVF after i've just found out this information

[Hdaniels11]

I've been in the infertility world for about 3 years and have been thinking about IVF for a while. I've been looking into it and google and everywhere i look it says IVF babies have a 50% increased risk of heart defects. WHAT? Is that true? do he literally never heard anything about that until now.
50% is massive!

I also learnt that Babies born from IVF have a much higher risk of any type of childhood cancer, as well as hepatic tumours compared with children born from natural conception.
I know ANY child or person can inevitably get cancer at any time but seeing all this stuff about their being a higher risk is scaring me.

I would love some insight into how accurate this is?
Has anyone got children made from IVF with these issues?
Aibu to be worried

Did having IVF cause more pregnancy complications?

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3650450/

I think you'll have to do some reading OP.

I know nothing about it personally, but a quick google threw up the above research and many more you can wade through. It seems there are greater risks.

I have no knowledge in this area but my first question would be where did you read it and are they reliable sources of information

Yes there is an increase, but you are still looking at a very rare event, whether IVF or spontaneous.

For example, this peer-reviewed metanalysis found that the rate of congenital heart disease in spontaneously conceived babies was 0.68% and in IVF babies was 1.30%.

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29164811/

I've never heard of this, but even if it is true a 50% increase, although it sounds like a lot, actually really isn't. Eg if 1 in 100 naturally conceived children have a heart defect, a 50% increase would mean that 1.5 out of 100 children conceived via IVF have a heart condition. So not a great increase at all. I wouldn't let this put me off trying IVF.

There are risks involved in everything we do. You have to have an informed opinion to decide if you accept the risks.

Remember - a increase of 50% isn't a 50% risk. So if the risk is, say, 1%, increasing it by 50% is 1.5%

Does that make sense?

Hi, I have no experience with IVF but I think you should speak to a reputable IVF clinic about your concerns. Google always gives the worst case scenario on everything.

Also, while a 50% increase may sound huge the relative risk is still probably quite low as the starting risk is probably low e.g a 0.2% chance becomes 0.4%

Sorry cross posted with above!

If you don't like to take risks then I suggest you don't have children at all tbh, anything could happen from conception to birth and then any number of accidents and tragedies for their whole life.

There are some increased risks (yet still relatively small overall) but not necessarily because of the IVF itself, the population doing IVF might for example have lower quality eggs, sperm etc than the population in general.

Also yes, like others have mentioned the increased risk of issues isn't necessarily caused by the IVF itself. People doing IVF tend to be older, have poorer quality sperm or eggs etc, all of which can increase the risk of problems.

Close relative of mine had 3 children via IVF. They are now all in their 20's and perfectly healthy. I had 2 children naturally. The 1st born had a rare chromosome disorder meaning they were severely disabled and only lived until they were 22. 2nd DC was diagnosed with ASD at age of 6.
Hope that helps put your fears into perspective.

Is IVF the only option for you? If so, I'd just weigh up a potential and small risk or the very real risk of not having any children naturally.

Most of my naturally conceived pregnancies ended in trisomy miscarriages. Currently pregnant with healthy IVF twins. I know the risk for them but weighed up the pregnancy against not having more children. There's always a risk in every pregnancy of complications of many kinds.

Plus it seems the high incidence of multiple birth with ivf skews the data.

More chance of SEN as well unfortunately.

I wonder if the data is skewed because people who have IVF are likely to be older, and so it's the issue of older gametes creating the risk?

Does IVF make it more likely that an embryo that wouldn't normally be strong enough to implant naturally does in fact implant? I was under the impression that with IVF, implanting is a trickier part of the process than getting a viable embryo, but I don't have experience of this so I don't know.

Relative vs absolute risks OP, there are some great resources to explain it in helpful terms, e.g. patient.info/news-and-features/calculating-absolute-risk-and-relative-risk

Absolute bane of my professional life is the media’s inability to appreciate the difference between the two and the anxiety it subsequently causes.

Best of luck whatever you decide.

There's also the risk of the needle being misplaced and you dying. That gave me food for thought. Again incredibly small odds but we knew someone who came very close to death for that reason.
Thing is - like everything with ivf - it's binary. You will or you won't have a child, they will or won't have a problem. It takes a while to get your head round. If they offer counselling I'd use it as it helps.

Careful what sources you read

Look at the metanalysis - they looked at incidence of singleton/multiple births to eliminate this as a confounder

l Haven’t heard these stats before but from my personal experience:

aged 23 had Ivf (ICSI) .. perfectly healthy baby currently in KS2 and exceeding all expected school targets

was slower than others in his nursery walking but this is normal in kids to vary ivf or not.

The Ivf process itself however is very gruelling but for me was 1million trillion percent worth it.

Ad others have said the stats sound scary but a 50% increase of 1 is 1.5

No. Embryo transfer is just that. The embryo is transferred into the uterus and left to impart on its own, it isn’t somehow implanted artificially. The majority fail to implant.

IVF twins here - they will be 16 in 3 months. They were both 7 weeks early but played football and basket ball when younger, they swim in lakes (we live in Scandinavia) do regular school jogs and ski. One had baby asthma but grew out of it, the other had eczema but grew out of it. All good so far?

My DH and I both have a history of heart disease in our families but it never stopped us trying for a family. We are aware of it and have both had recent monitoring as a precaution. We were never discouraged from trying by clinic and trust me they do extensive tests.

Are you really sure you want to do IVF? It's expensive, invasive and not an automatic jackpot - it's natural to feel apprehensive, especially after trying to conceive for 3 years

Good luck OP.