Success rates of IVF clinics disclosed

DESPERATE women and couples hoping to conceive via IVF will for the first time get an honest assessment of their chances of falling pregnant.

From Monday, couples will have access to the performance rates of Australia’s IVF clinics, allowing greater transparency on success rates.

They will also be able to predict their chance of having a baby through IVF by entering their age and clinical details into a calculator on the YourIVFSuccess website.

The online aid means prospective parents will be able to get the same information presented the same way about every clinic, all in one place.

The statistics underpinning the tool come from the University of NSW’s Australian and New Zealand assisted reproduction database, which records every IVF procedure ever undertaken in Australia.

Of the 76 clinics operating long enough to have their clinic success rates published, 92 per cent consented to have their results on the website.

Centre Alliance Senator Stirling Griff, who led the charge for the release of the performance information, said until now the industry had operated “as a secret society”.

“There were many instances of people I knew who changed clinic after a period of time and achieved success with going to a new clinic and so you start to think, why, what’s the issue here?” he said.

In 2017 the worst performing IVF clinic in Australia had a birthrate of just 9.3 per cent, while at the top-performing clinic, more than a third of women took home a baby.