Prolonged Effects of ART: a Record Linkage study (PEARL)
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Prolonged Effects of Assisted reproductive technologies on the health of women and their children: a Record Linkage study for England (PEARL)
IRAS ID
177855
Contact name
Claire Carson
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Oxford
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
15_090R_amend, CPRD ISAC
Duration of Study in the UK
4 years, 7 months, 24 days
Research summary
In general, most children born after the use of fertility treatment (such as IVF) are healthy. However, there is a small increase in the number of children who are born early, have a low birthweight, and who have health or developmental problems. Less is known about the health of children born after fertility treatment as they grow up, as long-term follow-up studies are costly and time consuming. As a result, many studies are not big enough to detect small differences between the groups – which is important because the effects of fertility treatment on health may be subtle. More evidence is also needed about the long term wellbeing of women who have had fertility treatment.
PEARL is a record-linkage study of women and children in England. The study aims to:1. Find out the effect of fertility problems and fertility treatment on the health and development of ART children to adolescence
2. Look at the impact of successful fertility treatment on the health and wellbeing of women who underwent treatment
3. Estimate the additional costs to the NHS (if any) of caring for women and their children after successful fertility treatment
4. Explore how changes in the number of patients agreeing to allow information about their fertility treatment to be used in research affects the results of studies that use this information.PEARL will include about 270,000 mothers and their children, around 4000 of whom will have had fertility treatment. The information we will use will comes from over 20 years of existing health records: details of fertility treatments held by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority; health records from GP practices in England held by the Clinical Practice Research Datalink; and records of hospital care, from Hospital Episode Statistics already linked to CPRD data.
REC name
South Central - Hampshire B Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
16/SC/0222
Date of REC Opinion
10 May 2016
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion