IVF is generally believed to be a benign, if expensive, form of treatment for infertility. However, a survey of IVF specialists in Britain for the 30th anniversary of the birth of Louise Brown shows that the experts are racked by doubts over their own specialty. According to the poll 85% of them want more clinical trials to test the efficacy of new IVF techniques. More than half agree that new procedures are being offered to patients far too quickly and before trials have adequately assessed whether or not they are effective.

The chair of the British Fertility Society, Dr Mark Hamilton, said that he was pleased to see that so many of his colleagues wanted clinical trials to test "untested and hugely expensive techniques [which are] widely offered in IVF clinics". These include reproductive immune therapy and pre-implantation genetic screening.

"Obviously people who are desperate to have a child will want to pursue every avenue possible," says Dr Hamilton, "but this survey shows that experts themselves are keen not to exploit this vulnerability and want to ensure that we have the same standards of evidence based clinical practice as we have with other routine medical treatments."

What Dr Hamilton delicately avoided saying is that some prominent colleagues are using, and even promoting, some of these very techniques. The Bridge Clinic, for instance, one of the best-known in London, offers PGS, as does the Assisted Reproduction & Gynaecology Centre, which claims to have the highest success rates. Furthermore around 40% of all infertility procedures in the UK involve ICSI or intracytoplasmic sperm injection (and as much as 80% in Greece, Italy and Spain), yet this technique has never had clinical trials.

Siladitya Bhattacharya, professor of reproductive medicine at Aberdeen University, told the Daily Mail: "There is often a great demand from patients who get frustrated with multiple failures of IVF. They read about new treatments on websites and when patients are desperate, they will try anything. Some of the drugs used have side effects. It is not something for the faint-hearted to get into." ~ British Fertility Society