Children of IVF

This chapter has reviewed issues relevant to the consideration of children conceived by in vitro fertilization. The rationale and motivation for studying these children and the factors which might be relevant to their development have been discussed. Such factors involve the child, the parents, the family as a whole and the influences of the community at large. While as yet there is a paucity of research concerning these issues, questions can be generated by reference to possible related areas, such as adoption. The authors then discussed their study of a group comprising the first families (49 children) whose children were conceived by IVF in the Monash Hospital. All children received paediatric follow-up and 33 has psycho-social follow-up. The findings do not indicate any increased risk of pathology in IVF children or in their families. However, there was a significant increase in very low birth weight children and in twins. Those children with problems tended to fall into these two groups. It is recognized that this was an unmatched group seen at an early stage in development. The significance of these findings have been discussed and issues for management raised. There was also discussion of future directions for research in this area, particularly the need for a careful, long-term follow-up study of families in which children are conceived by in vitro fertilization.