Sean Lauber: IVF Birthweights Catching Up to the General Population
Sean Lauber, Founder of Remembryo, shared on LinkedIn:
“Babies conceived through IVF have historically had lower birthweights than babies conceived without fertility treatment, which is concerning because being born too small is linked to health problems.
Researchers aren’t sure why, but ovarian stimulation, embryo culture conditions, and underlying infertility may play a role.
In a new study, Kondowe et al. (2026) looked at birthweight trends of 140,859 babies born after IVF and other assisted reproductive treatments in the UK between 1991 and 2018.
After accounting for pregnancy time and other factors, average birthweight increased by about 75 grams between 1991 and 2012, then remained stable to 2018.
They also found that babies born small for gestational age declined from about 16% to 11%. However, babies born large for gestational age increased from 3.5% to 5.5%.
The average birthweight was still a bit lower than in the general population, but the gap has narrowed over time, which the authors think is reassuring.
It’s not clear what caused these changes. Improvements in IVF laboratory techniques, changes in clinical practices, and differences in the patients receiving treatment could all have contributed.
This post is a quick look at one study, rather than a full breakdown on Remembryo.
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Title: Birthweight trends for babies born using Assisted Reproductive Treatments between 1991 and 2018: a national cohort study
Authors: Fiskani J M Kondowe, Matthew Gittins, Peter Clayton, Daniel R Brison, Stephen A Roberts
You can read the Full Article in Human Reproduction.
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