(Philadelphia, PA) - Infertility prevents roughly 6.1 million people in the United States from having children. As a result, infertile individuals and couples commonly seek to become parents through assisted reproductive technology (ART). Since 1981, approximately 177,000 babies have been born via ART: and, in one year alone (2000), some 100,000 cycles of ART were attempted, resulting in 60,253 live births. Beyond the factors of infertility and a candidate's ability to afford treatment, little is known about the qualifications that ART programs use to determine a candidate's eligibility for parenthood. This raises the question: Should there be guidelines to determine who should be eligible to use this technology for reproduction?

A new study sponsored by the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine sheds important light on the values that govern access to ART. The study, published in the January 2005 issue of the journal Fertility and Sterility, reveals an alarming inconsistency in the candidate-screening practices of different ART programs in the United States. Indeed, "the majority of programs in the U.S. do not have a formal policy for screening, leaving individual clinics and programs to set their own boundaries" says Andrea Gurmankin, PhD, principal investigator for the study, which was completed while Gurmankin was still a member of Penn's faculty: she has since joined the Harvard School of Public Health, where she now serves as Assistant Professor in the Department of Society, Human Development and Health. By contrast, many countries, such as the United Kingdom, have national or professional guidelines for screening program candidates.

According to the researchers, the important role played by clinics in controlling access to ART in the U.S. emphasizes the need to more openly discuss and, in turn, establish ART candidate-screening qualifications to ensure equality across different programs. The study also reve
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Contact: Tiffany Savickas
tiffany.savickas@uphs.upenn.edu
215-615-3353
University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine
18-Jan-2005

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