When Professor Michael Chapman opened his IVF clinic in Kogarah 20 years ago, patients had only about a 15 per cent chance of falling pregnant each cycle.
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Today, couples undergoing treatment at IVF Australia Southern Sydney have a 45 percent chance of success per cycle.
‘‘Of all the patients that come to us, certainly if they are under 45, there is a 70 percent chance of going away with a baby,’’ Professor Chapman said.
Professor Chapman and his wife Fiona, an embryologist, had set up publicly funded IVF clinics in London, Italy and Saudi Arabia, before they opened what was then known as IVF South on January 30, 1996.
They worked side by side, she in the lab and he directly with the desperate couples who came seeking help.
Within a month, they had their first success. A patient, Sandra Fisk, was pregnant after just one cycle of IVF.
She went on to have twin daughters, Brittany and Lacinda, now 19, who were among about 70 families who attended a celebration at Carss Bush Park on Sunday marking the clinic’s 20th anniversary.
‘‘It was really emotional,’’ she said. ‘‘I am just eternally grateful. Every day I thank my lucky stars that we were able to fall pregnant.’’
Mrs Fisk said some of her friends were never able to conceive and she went on to set up a support group for other couples struggling with infertility.
Destiny operated for 10 years and she said it helped couples cope with the isolation that felt.
Professor Chapman told the crowd an estimated 3000 babies had been born as a result of some form of fertility treatment at the clinic.
He thanked his wife and all the staff but paid special tribute to the patients, especially those who had gone through IVF only to have their dreams shattered.
Professor Chapman said there had been numerous advances in Assisted Reproductive Technology over the past 20 years that not only aided success rates but led to less risk to women undergoing treatment and fewer multiple births, which meant better outcomes for babies.
He said treatment cycles were now shorter and there was less chance of over-stimulating women’s ovaries.
Some of the biggest changes had taken place in the laboratory, both worldwide and closer to home.
Polarised light microscopy technology used to choose the best embryos for implantation was an IVF Australia discovery and had resulted in much better success rates.
