Success rate confusion!

[Patientlywaiting1984]

Hi all,

I was just wondering if anyone has had IVF treatment at the London Women's Clinic. My husband and I are likely going to need to have IVF and I've been researching clinics in preparation. A new branch of the LWC is opening very close to where I live so this would be ideal. However, I've been researching success rates with the LWC and on their website they quote a success rate of 49.4% (data from Oct 2013-Sept 2014) which is much higher than the national average of about 32%. However, when I looked on the HFEA website, it says success rates for LWC are about 28%(second quarter 2013). Do any of you know why this might be? I thought maybe it could be to do with the time periods involved but would the rates vary that much?

Any help would be greatly appreciated! xx

We used LWC in Swansea ( various tests and meds) and they were great. Why dont you give them a call and ask them to explain? Hope it goes well for you.

The data on HFEA is from the previous year. So they could potentially have had a much more successful year oct 13-sept 14 than july 12-june 13.

Although that is quite a leap in success rates

Also the success rates on their website are successful pregnancy i.e. heartbeat. HFEA is live births. Although I wouldn't have expected that to account for such a difference.

I'd give them a call and ask for further info

Hi, I think you should really be going by the HFEA figures as they are meant to be consistent and audited. HFEA shows livebirths, which is the most important measure of successful treatment. But as Fatima points out, that means the HFEA figures won't be the most recent. The clinic website figures could be showing anything, e.g. apart from obviously excluding miscarriages post 6-7 weeks, this might not include cancelled cycles (HFEA shows success as a percentage of all cycles started), or perhaps they are only presenting figures for the patients with high prognosis? Who knows. Anyway, it is extremely difficult to compare clinics on stats alone. Every clinic treats a different population of patients, and some even actively discourage the hopeless cases. It's much more important to find a place you are comfortable with and have confidence in.