Healthy Lifestyle Important for Pregnancy Success: Alcohol Consumption Can Damage Fertility in Women

Consuming alcohol during infertility treatment can lower pregnancy success, researchers say.

Dara Godfrey, a dietitian at the Reproductive Medicine Associates New York Clinic in the US, analysed the impact of alcohol consumption on assisted reproductive technology (ART) outcome. ART includes all the artificial methods adopted by people who experience difficulties to conceive naturally. In vitro fertilisation (IVF), intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI), cryopreservation and intrauterine insemination (IUI) are some of the ART methods commonly used. 

The study included 90 women undergoing IVF treatment (the process of manually combining an egg and sperm in a laboratory). All the participants had experienced three rounds of IVF failure.

Godfrey and colleagues found that regular consumption of alcohol - just three glasses of wine a week - reduced the success of IVF by 70 percent. Abstaining from alcohol during the treatment increased chances of pregnancy by 90 percent, Daily Mail reported.

Godfrey, while presenting her findings at a meeting of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine in Boston, recommended women who are struggling to become mothers to create an alcohol-free environment, by stop drinking three months prior to the IVF treatment.

"My advice to patients is always to limit or abstain from alcohol. But whether they do or not its up to them. Alcohol definitely has a detrimental effect on pregnancy success," The Telegraph, quoted lead author Godfrey, as saying.

Researchers said that alcohol can affect the normal development of the egg, so can have similar impact on women without any fertility problems and who are trying to get pregnant naturally.

The study re-confirms previous findings. A report in the journal BMJ stated that alcohol intake significantly lowered the chances of pregnancy success.

Another study reported journal Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research said that heavy drinking during the young age damaged fertility in women.