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31 May 2007

The HFEA strongly refutes any allegation that it is failing women in its regulation of the UK's IVF sector.

The HFEA goes to the extent of its powers to regulate those procedures involving the creation of embryos outside the body and donor sperm and the implantation of these into a woman. As with all areas of medicine, the UK's system of regulation for IVF procedures and associated treatment involves co-ordinated working between a series of regulators.

We have given very public warnings people going through IVF about untested and unvalidated treatments, such as Reproductive Immunology, and tell patients to make sure they are clear about what they will be paying for - as more than a third of patients tell us they pay more for their IVF treatment than they expect.

However, the HFEA does not have the legal power or role to regulate any treatments that doctors or clinics offer alongside the IVF procedures. These are a matter for a doctor's professional judgement, for which they are accountable to the General Medical Council.

Likewise the HFEA is not a financial regulator and we have no legal remit to regulate the cost or provision of treatment. However we do encourage patients to discuss this issue carefully with their clinic. We strongly believe clinics should give each and every patient a costed treatment plan before their treatment starts, detailing all the procedures that take place and what they will cost, so a patient is properly able to discuss these matters with their clinician to ensure that they are happy with what is planned for them.

It is surprising when we see professionals who have worked in the field of IVF who badly misunderstand the role and scope of the HFEA's regulation. Doctors and other professionals who have concerns about professional standards - such as the use of unscientific treatments and unnecessary procedures - should be raising these issues through their professional bodies such as the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, the General Medical Council and the British Fertility Society.

We do everything in our powers to uphold appropriate standards in the sector. Our inspection and regulation of IVF procedures holds clinics to account to help make sure these procedures are safe and appropriate for patients. We also scrutinise patient information that clinics give to their patients as part of our inspection and licensing procedure.

In addition to this work around patient safety, we have an important role in producing our own impartial patient information. This includes our Guide to Infertility, Find a Clinic data - giving details of clinics services and success rates, patient factsheets about particular procedures and a range of Questions and Answers on a number of important topics.

Ends

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Notes to editors

The HFEA is the independent regulator for IVF treatment and embryo research. Our role is to protect patients and the public interest, to drive improvement in the treatment and research sectors and to provide information to the public and policymakers about treatment and research.

The HFEA was set up in August 1991 as part of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990.  The HFEA's principal tasks are to license and monitor clinics that carry out in vitro fertilisation (IVF), donor insemination (DI) and human embryo research. The HFEA also regulates the storage of gametes (eggs and sperm) and embryos.

For further information please contact the HFEA press office.

Page last updated: 11 March 2009

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