A new, “gentler” hormone may help make IVF procedures safer. New Scientist Health reports:

Say hello to Heath (pictured). He’s the first baby in the world to be born using a new IVF technique that researchers hope will be safer for would-be mothers.

During IVF, a woman’s ovaries are stimulated to boost ovulation and harvest eggs. This is usually done by an injection of human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG), a hormone involved in progesterone secretion.

But sometimes this leads to ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome. OHSS is mild in a third of women having IVF, causing abdominal bloating, but for one woman in 20 it also causes vomiting and diarrhoea. In extreme cases it can be fatal. Women with polycystic ovary syndrome – a leading cause of infertility – are at greater risk of OHSS.

The problem with hCG is that it is too potent, says Waljit Dhillo at Imperial College London. His team hypothesised that another hormone, called kisspeptin, may be gentler. Its effects are short-lived and during pregnancy it naturally increases to 7000 times the usual level, so should have minimal side effects.

Dhillo tested the hormone in 30 women having IVF. Suzannah Kidd became the first to give birth as a result – Heath, a healthy boy, was born on 26 April. Dhillo thinks that IVF success rates will be as good with kisspeptin as they are with current methods. “We’ll know in six months,” he says.

Dhillo presented his results to the Endocrine Society in San Francisco this week.

Simon Fishel at CARE Fertility in Nottingham, UK, thinks the results are exciting. “It’s an opportunity that needs to be studied,” he says. “It could be very important if it eliminates OHSS.”