Fertility clinics rated online

Fertility clinics are for the first time to be rated on their likely chance of delivering a baby.

The information, to be included on a revamped website, marks a departure from "historical" guidance which experts say is unreliable.

Previously the "Choose a Fertility Clinic" service from the body that regulates and licenses In-Vitro Fertilisation (IVF) clinics only showed recorded live birth data.

The new site from the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) continues to include those figures. But in addition it estimates the "predicted chance" of a live birth at each clinic, based on a range of values.

The change is designed to give patients a more meaningful picture of IVF success rates.

Historical data can be misleading due to statistical anomalies that arise from some clinics treating more patients than others.

For instance, a clinic that delivers three live births from 10 treatment cycles has a 30% success rate. So does a clinic that delivers 30 births from 100 cycles.

But if each helps one more patient to have a baby, the increase in success rate is disproportionately higher for the smaller clinic. Its live birth rate soars to 40%.

The new service is based around a tier system so patients can move from one level of detail to another depending on what they want.

Generally it offers a wider range of information than was previously available, including a comprehensive description of all the services clinics offer, better statistics on different types of fertility treatment, and profiles of the kinds of patients typically treated at each clinic.