Published 23 July 2008, doi:10.1136/bmj.a934
Cite this as: BMJ 2008;337:a934

News

Charity calls on MPs to end postcode lottery in IVF treatment

Lisa Hitchen

1 London

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Doctors involved in fertility services should write to their MPs to try to end the postcode lottery over how many cycles of in vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatment patients in England receive, says Infertility Network UK.

The charity’s chief executive, Clare Brown, called on clinicians to do more in her speech at a conference in London last week. She said, "They should write to MPs, they should write to the minister, they should kick up a stink with the PCTs [primary care trusts] and not just accept one cycle. They should push as hard as the patients."

Figures for 2007 issued by the Department of Health last month showed that only seven (5%) of 152 primary care trusts in England were funding three full cycles of IVF treatment, as recommended four years ago by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE).

A survey in 2006 by Infertility Network UK . . . [Full text of this article]


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