A new, user-friendly free IVF prediction tool - powered by national fertility treatment data - has been launched by the University of Aberdeen.
Every year, millions of people worldwide turn to IVF in the hope of having a family. Yet success rates remain highly variable and difficult for patients to understand. Drawing on data collected from all licensed fertility treatments across the UK, the calculator translates this information to give tailored success estimates based on factors such as age and specific infertility diagnoses.
With fertility treatment often involving significant emotional, physical and financial commitment, having realistic expectations can be crucial for planning next steps. Couples often face repeated cycles and while clinicians do their best to guide patients, the complexity of fertility treatment means it can be challenging to give clear, tailored predictions.
To address this, the first IVF calculator was launched in 2016 as a statistical model, designed primarily as a scientific tool. Despite not being built with patient experience in mind, it was used by more than 2,500 people around the world each month – highlighting the demand for accessible, evidence-based information about IVF success rates.
Researchers have now completely redesigned the tool to centre on usability and the patient journey, while also updating it to reflect developments in IVF practice, policy and population trends over the past decade. The medical statisticians teamed up with postgraduate students from the University’s Aberdeen Software Factory, run by the School of Natural and Computing Sciences, to develop the new tool.
Like the original calculator, it can show how success rates change across multiple IVF cycles - helping couples understand when continuing treatment may significantly increase their chances and when gains begin to level off. The new, more intuitive design, now allows couples to easily navigate the tool depending on the stage of their fertility journey for both IVF (in vitro fertilisation) and ICSI (intracytoplasmic sperm injection) cycles.
The data powering the calculator has been updated with an additional six years of data collected from the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA), compiled from all licensed fertility treatments in the UK.
Dr David McLernon, Senior Research Fellow in Medical Statistics at the University of Aberdeen who leads the project, said: “Fertility treatment costs thousands of pounds and could involve months or years of uncertainty, making realistic success estimates crucial for planning. Our calculator, first launched in 2016, was an important step in turning years of national IVF data into a practical tool to help those on this difficult journey, but although we were proud to be able to open our original calculator up to the public, it had its limitations – most notably that it was never created with the patient journey in mind.”
Researchers have analysed user feedback and worked with volunteers undergoing fertility treatment, recruited with the assistance of the Fertility Alliance charity, to produce the more refined version of the IVF calculator centred around useability. In 2023, 18,520 opposite-sex couples using their own eggs and sperm started their first IVF treatment in the UK.
It now offers three different pathways – one for those who have not yet started fertility treatment, another for those who have had their first embryo transfer, and a third for those who have already completed a full round and want to start another. This means the calculator can produce more tailored results accounting for a larger range of patient and treatment factors and in keeping with recent changes in IVF practice and policies, as well as shifting demographics such as the age at which people start trying for children.
Dr McLernon added: “One of the most difficult aspects of IVF is understanding how long or costly the process might be. Our calculator can show couples the cumulative chances of success for between one and six rounds of IVF, which is increasingly important following updated NICE fertility guidance which used OPIS in its cost-effectiveness analysis to update access criteria for IVF. The new guidance keeps its previous recommendation of funding three full cycles of IVF for women under 40 but has added that a further three full cycles could be considered if the first three are unsuccessful.”
As an example, with just one round the statistical chances of success may be low, but by the time it reaches three rounds, that jumps to a high success rate. However, beyond this it may tail off again – and this point is different for everyone based on many different factors it would be impossible to calculate manually.
Dr McLernon continued: “Having a better understanding of their chances of success helps people to prepare emotionally and financially for the potentially difficult journey on which they are about to embark. Our first calculator delivered solid statistical results, but this new version brings those insights into a platform that’s clearer, more intuitive and genuinely built for patients.”
Dr Milan Markovic, who leads the Aberdeen Software Factory, added: “Our students have taken extensive feedback and insights from the inbuilt OPIS feedback questionnaire and ‘think‑aloud’ user sessions to completely re‑engineer the original IVF calculator. This is hugely valuable for students as they gain experience of developing user-driven products.
“The result is a tool that is more functional, easier to navigate and far clearer in how it presents results. It has been an invaluable opportunity for students to work on a real‑world project with meaningful impact.”
The IVF calculator can be accessed at https://opis.asf.abdn.ac.uk/. It includes a ‘Rate your experience’ function to allow users to share thoughts or experience anonymously.
ENDS