Is it easy for a 41 year old woman to get pregnant by ivf? she's overweight & doesn't excercise.

I : I looked up sart ivf 2010 success rates. 12 percent of women between the ages 41 of 42 had live births with ivf using their own fresh embryos. 21 percent of women between the ages of 41 to 42 years old had live births using ivf with their own frozen embryos. If you don't mind me asking, i was wondering about the reason for the 3 emails regarding pregnancy at 41 years old.

Dr : Dr fowler's information is accurate - in general we expect a 15-25 % pregnancy rate in 41-42 year old women with ivf. This depends on many individual factors as well. Most women in their 40's have signs of diminished ovarian reserve (low egg supply) but this varies and some wil get pregnant relatively easily with ivf, while others struggle. The effect of weight on an ivf cycle is complex. Body mass index (bmi) is not a perfect measure of overweight/ obesity, but it is easy to measure and is a useful tool for studies measuring the effects of obesity as it takes height and weight into account, not just weight. It does not work for people who are low fat/high muscle weight like bodybuilders, but it's useful for the rest of us and is easy to calculate (see the link below). Bmi 18.5 to under 25 is ideal, 25-30 is overweight, and 30 or above is considered obesity. High bmi affects how well ivf drugs are absorbed into the body - most are given as subcutaneous injections (into the fatty tissue under the skin) - so higher doses of injectable medication may be needed. High bmi probably also affects how well embryos implant. Many studies show that high bmi (over 24, over 27, over 30) can result in reduced implantation rates (the chance that each embryo will 'take' in the uterus) without affecting embryo quality, and this leads to lower pregnancy rates with increased bmi. There are also studies that show that women with high bmi have the same success rates as women with lower bmi, but just need higher medication doses. The question has not been definitely settled. Very high bmi (40 or over) affects the safety of ivf - egg retrieval procedures are usually done on an oupatient basis. Many centers use md anesthesiologists, and it is normal not to intubate the patient during the procedure, as we would do for a laparoscopy or major surgery. It makes sense to have an upper limit of bmi for most centers in the us for ivf patients - this varies from center to center but could be in the 40-42.5 range. Pregnancy complications such as gestational diabetes rise with high bmi as well, and some fertility clinics will not treat women with bmi over 45 even with low-tech treatments like clomid, (clomiphene) but again policies vary from clinic to clinic. For younger women, especially under 35 with normal ovarian reserve testing, it may be worth delaying treatment until after losing weight, for older women, as long as they are in a safe bmi range, it is often better not to delay treatment especially by 6 months or a year. I have seen successful healthy pregnancies in women with bmi in the low to mid 40's undergoing ivf. So exercise and losing weight is good for most americans, but for a 41 year old woman who needs ivf it's a discussion to have with her fertility md and it's usually better not to delay treatment unless she is in a weight range where her reproductive endocrinologist or anesthesiologist feels it's not safe to proceed. Hope this helps. Best wishes.