Press Release - Tubal Reversal Study 2007

NEW STUDY SHOWS TUBAL REVERSAL SURGERY IS BETTER OPTION FOR WOMEN DESIRING CHILDREN AFTER TUBAL LIGATION

Six-year study shows tubal reversal surgery results in higher pregnancy and live birth rates and is less costly than IVF.

(CHAPEL HILL, NC) – Dr. Gary S. Berger, M.D., director of Chapel Hill Tubal Reversal Center, today released the most comprehensive study done to date of tubal reversal surgery and its resulting outcomes, showing that for the majority of women who have undergone a tubal ligation procedure and decide later they would like to have more children, tubal reversal surgery is a better option than in vitro fertilization (IVF).

“The results are clear – across all ages of women included, our results with tubal reversal surgery led to higher numbers of pregnancies and live births than standard IVF procedures.” said Berger. “Besides having higher success rates, the one-hour outpatient procedure is less than half the cost of an IVF cycle.”

“Many people, including doctors, mistakenly believe that tubal ligation surgery is a permanent method of birth control,” continued Dr. Berger. Tubal reversal surgery – a one-hour outpatient procedure – rejoins the separated segments of fallopian tube so that eggs can become fertilized and travel down the tubes to the uterus, allowing a pregnancy to occur naturally.”

When the tubal reversal statistics from Chapel Hill Tubal Reversal Center were compared with the latest national IVF statistics, pregnancy and birth rates after tubal reversal were higher than after IVF in every age group. Besides its higher success rate, the cost of the one-hour outpatient tubal reversal operation performed by Dr. Berger is less than half the cost of an IVF cycle.

The study report includes 3,139 patients who underwent tubal reversal surgery by Dr. Berger between January 2001 and December 2005. This is the largest and most definitive study in existence that provides information on the outcome of tubal reversal surgery.

At the conclusion of the study interval, 69 percent of the women in Dr. Berger’s study had reported pregnancies. The pregnancy rate ranged from 82 percent for women under 30 to 41 percent for women 40 years of age and older. The highest pregnancy rate (87 percent) was among women age under 30 after reversal of a previous ring or clip method of sterilization.

Dr. Berger, one of the pioneers of tubal reversal surgery, is a reproductive surgeon who specializes in and limits his practice to outpatient tubal reversal surgery.