I have been advising a friend today who works for an organisation in the UK that delivers NAPRO fertility treatment in co-operation with medical practitioners.

The organisation stipulates that its fertility treatment will not be available to couples who have undergone IVF procedure and have embryos in storage. A man and a woman are not eligible for treatment unless married to each other.

My advice was that it is improper to impose these these restrictions. The only material consideration for a doctor is the life and health of his patient: that he has before him a human being who is sick and in need of treatment to heal a malfunctioning reproductive system.

Is this within the range of acceptable advice?

Michael

I went to the official website for naprotechnology as it relates to fertility care: http://fertilitycare.net/Infertility.htm

Here is what it says about couples which had IVF:

NaProTechnology has been available in Ireland since February 1998. In that time over 2,000 couples have been treated with an overall success rate of about 40%. Even couples with a history of failed IVF can expect to have a successful pregnancy about 30% of the time using NaProTechnology. To date nearly 200 couples with previously failed IVF have conceived using this approach. In cases of recurrent miscarriage, nearly 80% of couples will have a successful pregnancy. Couples with a history of eight to nine previous miscarriages have now had successful pregnancies using this system.

On the subject of marriage as a prerequisite, that position is in line with Catholic teaching on sex outside of marriage, and infidelity. A doctor can choose to deny his services for a wide variety of reasons and I think the conversation has to be why the policy exists regarding marriage.

Judie Brown

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