Family Life

03.30.10 | FL News Team

Pennsylvania researchers have linked the odds of a woman successfully conceiving through in-vitro fertilization to air pollution. The study, which was conducted on more than 74-hundred women by researchers at the Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, suggests that the quality of air breathed had a subtle effect on women trying to reproduce. Overall, 36 percent of the women became pregnant after their first IVF treatment. But those odds dropped to 20 percent for women exposed to higher levels of nitrogen dioxide. The findings hint that nitrogen dioxide mainly from vehicle exhaust was connected to lower odds in the success of the in-vitro procedure.

 The study found differing results when it came to ozone pollution. Higher ozone levels in women after the procedure lessened the odds of woman becoming pregnant. But at the time of ovulation, high ozone levels appeared to increase the chances of giving birth. The study was conducted from 2000 to 2007 using women from three different fertility clinics in Hershey, Pennsylvania, New York City and Rockville, Maryland. To achieve accurate results, the clinics were located in suburban, rural and urban areas. The study appears online in the journal "Human Reproduction."