BOSTON, Oct. 20 (UPI) -- Women having difficulty conceiving a child might be helped by participating in a stress management program before in vitro fertilization, U.S. researchers say.
Alice Domar, executive director of The Domar Center for Mind/Body Health at Boston IVF, and of Harvard Medical School, says women who participated in a stress management program prior to or during their second IVF cycle had a 160 percent greater pregnancy rate than women who did not participate in a program.
The stress management program was designed to educate women on the utilization of cognitive, relaxation and lifestyle techniques to manage stress. Stress management had an even greater impact on pregnancy rates for women who showed higher baselines symptoms of depression.
Pregnancy rates increased to 67 percent for women with signs of depression at the start of the study who engaged in the stress management program vs. no pregnancies for those who did not.
"Reproductive health experts have long wondered about the impact that stress may have on fertility, thus impeding a woman's ability to conceive," Domar says in a statement. "This study shows that stress management may improve pregnancy rates, minimizing the stress of fertility management itself, improving the success rates of IVF procedures."
