Australian women unaware about their biological clock

A survey of more than 1000 women conducted on behalf of IVF Australia and affiliates of Virtus Health found 64 per cent of women did not know fertility rapidly declines after the age of 36. Six out of 10 also believed infertility in their 40’s was easily resolved with IVF. Professor Michael Chapman, fertility specialist IVF Australia said that the results show women did not have accurate information about their own reproductive health. “It’s a serious misconception that women can delay motherhood until their late 30s and rely on IVF to easily resolve their problems and conceive in their 40s, and these survey results suggest that is exactly what many women may do based on their beliefs,” Dr Chapman said. The survey also revealed one in five women incorrectly believed it only became difficult for a woman to fall pregnant naturally in her late 40’s. Dr Chapman said that 35 years of age was the turning point in a woman’s fertility. “For example, at 30, a woman has a 20 per cent chance of falling pregnant spontaneously per month, compared to less than 5 per cent chance per month when she is in her 40s,” he said.. A woman’s chance of conceiving via IVF in her 40’s is no guarantee he said. IVF success after the age of 45 is believed to be less than 1 per cent with a woman’s own eggs. “The reality is we can’t improve the quality of a woman’s eggs, and as a woman ages so do her eggs, and this impacts her chance of conceiving both spontaneously and with IVF,” Dr Chapman said. While the majority of Australian women have their first child at age 30, one in every 25 babies is now born to a mother over 40. In 2012, 12538 babies were born to 40-45 year olds. Dr Chgapman said the trend was also driven by fact women settle down later in life. “The other complicating factor is the reality that in today’s society many women don’t find their soul mate until their 30s, so we encourage women to understand their fertility to make decisions that suit their situation,” he said, adding stories like that of Halle Berry and Collette Dinnigan who both had a baby at age 47 were extremely rare. “The increase in media stories of celebrities having babies in their mid-40s has given people a false sense of security as to how age impacts their fertility,” Dr Chapman said. Article: 25th May 2014 www.dailytelegraph.com.au

http://blogs.prideangel.com/post/2013/09/Delaying-your-first-baby-could-lead-to-age-related-infertility.aspx

Young women who decide to delay their first baby until their late-30s are running the risk of being left childless because of age-related infertility, scientists have warned. A woman’s fertility declines dramatically after the age of 35 and an increasing number of women are finding that they have to turn to IVF treatment to have any hope of becoming pregnant, experts said. “Things are really going downhill between the ages of 30 and 40....the best cure of all is for women to have their babies before this clock strikes twelve,” said Professor Mary Herbert, a reproductive biologist at Newcastle University. “They should think of family planning not just in the context of preventing pregnancy but also think of it in the context of having your babies at a time when you still have your reproductive fitness...I would be worried if my own daughter didn’t have a child at 35,” Professor Herbert said. The number of British women between the ages of 35 and 39 giving birth for the first time has increased from 6.8 per cent in 1986 to 17 per cent in 2008. This has been accompanied by significant increase in the number of women over 40 seeking fertility treatment, many of whom will ultimately fail to become pregnant, the experts said. Fertility specialists are increasingly concerned about the trend towards having children later in life because, although it can work for some women, it causes problems for many more because female fertility declines so rapidly after 35. “Family planning has got to include when you are going to have your children as well and what we are seeing over the years is an increase in the age of women seeking fertility treatment,” said Jane Stewart, a consultant in reproductive medicine at Newcastle University. “We cannot get away from the age-related decline in fertility and I think to put forward the idea of delaying having children is fine for some people but it’s not fine for everybody,” she said. “I don’t think women understand the risks they run when they reach the older ages....It’s better to think about it [in your 20s] and having that thought process inform all possibilities,” she told the British Science Festival in Newcastle. Women are born with a certain number of egg cells in their ovaries and these are gradually lost as they get older, Dr Stewart said. “Women at the age of menopause have effectively run out of eggs. We do run out of time,” she told the meeting. Article: 13th September 2013 www.independent.co.uk

How long can you wait to have a baby? Apparently longer than most women think. The long-ingrained fear of age-induced infertility - that women will not be able to conceive if they wait too long - is actually based on science that dates back to the 17th Century. The widely-accepted notion that 30per cent of women aged 35 to 39 will fail to fall pregnant is based on a 2004 article published in the journal, Human Reproduction, according to The Atlantic. However the source of that data actually comes from French birth records between 1670 and 1830. It seems that studies of natural fertility in females have rarely included women born in the 20th century. Instead, the reported decline in fertility over the course of a woman’s Thirties has been based on statistics from a time when electricity was yet to be invented. Indeed, a more recent study, conducted in 2004 and published in Obstetrics & Gynecology, actually shows that women over 35 have an 82per cent chance of getting pregnant within a year. 'In our data, we’re not seeing huge drops until age 40,' explained Anne Steiner, an associate professor at the University of North Carolina. 'In short, the “baby panic” is based largely on questionable data,' writes The Atlantic's Jean Twenge. Ms Twenge also notes that studies of natural conception, regardless of age, are difficult to conduct and therefore, modern fertility statistics are under represented. 'Studies asking couples how long it took them to conceive or how long they have been trying to get pregnant are as unreliable as human memory,' she explains. 'And finding and studying women who are trying to get pregnant is challenging, as there’s such a narrow window between when they start trying and when some will succeed.' Unfortunately, fertility clinicians stand to benefit financially from women's heightened fear of infertility. The deeper anxiety women feel, the more likely they are to agree to expensive treatments, like in vitro fertilization -- which could be one explanation of doctors' widely cited infertility statistics that appear to be being oversold. Article: 21st June 2013 www.dailymail.co.uk