Rise in number of sperm donor errors at UK fertility centres

There has been an increase in the number of mistakes at UK fertility centres, with the wrong donor sperm used in one case, a report says.

The study, from the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA), showed that incidents are rare – affecting less than 1% of fertility treatment cycles – but have risen 6% over the last year and 18% in three years.

An increasing proportion of mistakes are serious, causing severe or moderate harm to patients.

Some of the increase is down to fertility clinics improving reporting of their errors, the HFEA said.

The data shows that, in 201819, there were 606 incidents, of which two were the most serious, grade A, and 294 were grade B.

Grade A incidents involve severe harm to one person, such as death or being implanted with the wrong embryo, or major harm to many people, such as a frozen storage unit containing the embryos of many patients failing.

Grade B incidents involve serious harm to one person or moderate harm to many people, such as sensitive personal data about more than one patient being sent to the wrong recipient.

In one grade A incident, an embryologist failed to verify the donor sperm process at the point of preparing laboratory records, resulting in the wrong sperm being used.

The HFEA said it believes fertility treatment is becoming safer, with the quality of care improving across UK clinics.

Around 80% of clinics were issued with a full licence, confirming that most are meeting expected standards and performing well, it said.