IVF Postcode lottery in the news again

Yet again the disparity of service the NHS provides is in the news - here is a link to several reports - but the nation's PCTs still seem reticent to do anything about it. What continues to puzzle us is that the Government and NICE (the National Institute for Clinical Excellence) both advise our PCTs to provide three course of IVF for all qualifying couples, yet each PCT sets its own set of criteria for who qualifies. For example, age restrictions which would exclude a couple from treatment in one PCT would be the age restrictions required to get treatment in another! And in one PCT the couple may be able to get the recommended three courses of IVF (the average required for success) yet in another they will get only two. Or one. Or, as is the case in North Yorkshire and York PCT, none at all.

We say, yet again, we have a NATIONAL Health Service so let's have a set of national guidelines which all PCTs are required to follow. And this goes for ALL NHS services, not just IVF. A Postcode Lottery is unfair, unjust and indefensible.