Mind-Body Connection

Yes, the holidays are fun, but stress and the holidays go hand in hand. Stress and trying to get pregnant — whether naturally or through fertility treatment, including in vitro fertilization (IVF) — do not.

The week between Christmas and New Year's may be an excellent time to do something nice for yourself that helps your mind, body and spirit. Or make a New Year's Resolution that you are going to do something to improve your mind/body health. It just might help boost your chances of conceiving. As a matter of fact, many fertility clinics now offer mind/body programs, acupuncture and other complementary therapies.

If you have read any news reports about stress and fertility treatment during 2011, you can’t help but be confused. Headlines range from “Study seeks to dispel stress myth in IVF treatment” to “Stress relief may improve IVF success.”

The relationship between stress and fertility is a controversial one, according to Alice Domar, Ph.D., Director of Mind/Body Services at Boston IVF.

But even though a recent meta-analysis of 14 studies, published in February’s British Medical Journal, did not observe a significant relationship between distress levels and outcome, Domar says there is a large body of research —including her own most recent study published in Fertility and Sterility — that has found relationships between distress levels and the success rate of in vitro fertilization (IVF).