Maria Banti
IVF Success Rates Explained: What Clinics Don’t Tell You — And What Actually Matters
TL;DR
- Not all success rates are equal — and some can be downright misleading.
- We break down the most common fertility metrics: what they mean, what they leave out, and how they're calculated.
- MyFertility focuses on the 3 that give you the clearest picture:
- ✅ LBR per cycle
- ✅ LBR per embryo transferred
- ✅ MBR per cycle
- 🔥 Plus: our exclusive Cost Per Baby metric
- Understand your odds and your investment before starting treatment.
📊 IVF Success Rates: The Metrics You’ll See — and What They Actually Mean
✅ Live Birth Rate (LBR) per Cycle Started
How it’s calculated: # of live births ÷ # of cycles started
Includes: all patients who began a treatment cycle, including cancelled or failed transfers
Why it matters: Gives a realistic view of success per full treatment attempt — the most patient-relevant metric.
✅ Live Birth Rate per Egg Collection
How it’s calculated: # of live births ÷ # of egg collections
Excludes: cycles cancelled before egg collection
Why it matters: Measures retrieval + lab efficiency, but doesn’t reflect full patient journey.
✅ Live Birth Rate per Embryo Transfer
How it’s calculated: # of live births ÷ # of embryo transfers
Excludes: all cycles that didn’t make it to transfer
Why it matters: Reflects clinical + lab success but may overestimate total odds of success.
⚠️ Live Birth Rate per Embryo Transferred
How it’s calculated: # of live births ÷ # of embryos transferred
Why HFEA uses it: Encourages single embryo transfers by evaluating individual embryo efficiency
But the problem is: It can mislead.
- Clinic A transfers 2 embryos and gets 1 baby = 50%
- Clinic B transfers 1 embryo and gets 1 baby = 100%
📉 The metric alone rewards low-risk strategies but lacks nuance. We include it — but always alongside LBR per cycle for context.
🫣 Pregnancy Rate per Cycle (or per transfer, per collection...)
How it’s calculated: # of clinical pregnancies ÷ # of treatment cycles
Why it’s risky: Pregnancy ≠ baby. These stats often exaggerate success.
🍼 Multiple Birth Rate (MBR) per Cycle
How it’s calculated: # of twin/triplet births ÷ # of cycles started
Why it matters: Tracks safety. We display it to help patients assess risks and clinic practices.
💰 Introducing: Cost Per Baby — The Metric That Really Hits Home
How it’s calculated: Total patient cost ÷ likelihood of live birth
Includes: meds, lab fees, monitoring, multiple cycles — not just the cheapest headline price
Why it matters: Clinics with low per-cycle costs but low success still cost more in the end. We created this stat to align financial planning with real outcomes.
🎯 Why MyFertility Displays These 3 Metrics — And Not the Rest
We show:
- ✅ LBR per cycle started
- ✅ LBR per embryo transferred
- ✅ MBR per cycle
- 🔥 Cost Per Baby
We don’t emphasize:
- ❌ Pregnancy rates
- ❌ LBR per embryo transferred as a standalone
- ❌ LBR per collection/transfer without cycle context
🧭 Final Thought: IVF Metrics Are Meant to Empower — Not Confuse
Fertility marketing often cherry-picks stats. At MyFertility, we empower you with clarity, not confusion.
