The future for women’s healthcare

When Madeleine Kearns got married in 2023, she knew she would have trouble getting pregnant. She had been told she likely had a gynecological disorder (though an official diagnosis couldn’t be given without an invasive surgery). Although doctors suggested in-vitro fertilization (IVF), Madeleine knew IVF wasn’t a route she and her husband could pursue due to their Catholic faith.

Madeleine isn’t alone. She is one of 53 million Catholics in America for whom IVF is prohibited as members of the Catholic Church. And while Protestants have no top-down prohibition against IVF as Catholics do, many of the 136 million Protestants in America have conscientious objections to IVF. Despite this, referrals for IVF based on “unexplained infertility” have become the standard of care for many women in the United States. As a system, women’s healthcare is broken, and while there are hopeful signs that the field is changing, major medical associations are seeking to stifle innovation and maintain the status quo.

After suffering many miscarriages and consulting many doctors, Madeleine became a mother to a healthy baby girl in July. When her doctors in New York City couldn’t help beyond referring her for IVF, Madeleine sought a cutting-edge practice in Missouri that specializes in giving women a real diagnosis, not just the catchall “unexplained infertility” (which is a fancy way for doctors to say, “I have no idea what’s wrong”). The Veritas Fertility and Surgery clinic was founded by a doctor trained in NaPro Technology, an innovative and successful approach to women’s healthcare that seeks to identify and treat the underlying causes of infertility so women have a greater likelihood of conceiving naturally (and being healthier overall).

NaPro Technology is one of a number of approaches that falls under the umbrella of Restorative Reproductive Medicine (RRM), a field that has existed for over 25 years and is growing in popularity. According to the International Institute for Restorative Reproductive Medicine, “RRM has a record of care that, compared to IVF, is less invasive, less expensive, and has improved maternal and neonatal health outcomes.”

According to Dr. Marguerite Duane and a number of other RRM physicians, RRM-trained doctors utilize “real-time data” from personalized charts that track a woman’s hormones and other physical changes. These charts are used to help identify potential underlying disorders, to time additional tests to a specific moment in her cycle, and to provide “hormone support, ovulation support or stimulation, and corrective surgery if needed.”

Notably, according to a groundbreaking review published this year in Therapeutic Advances in Reproductive Health, RRM is significantly less expensive than just one IVF cycle, has a higher live birth rate, and can be used to treat reproductive health issues long before a woman ever hopes to conceive. Where the average cost for RRM is $2,000-$5,000, one IVF cycle is $10,000-$15,000. Where RRM averages a 40-60% live birth rate, IVF averages 30-40% for one cycle. Additionally, a woman treated with RRM is much more likely to conceive again naturally after her first live birth without any additional intervention.

Truly, RRM should be the future for women’s healthcare in an era where infertility continues to surge and a fertility crisis looms. So why are the major medical associations denouncing RRM as “ideological, unproven, and ineffective”?

In August, the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) authored a letter to the National Governors Association and Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy “strongly oppos[ing] attempts to enshrine RRM into law or regulation as a purported standard of care.” The letter calls upon governors and Secretary Kennedy to “reject any legislative or regulatory proposals that would codify RRM.” It was signed by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine, and the Society of Gynecologic Surgeons.

RRM is not a magical fix-all that will solve every couple’s infertility. But if there are ways to diagnose and treat the underlying causes of infertility, why aren’t they offered as a first-line treatment in every clinic in the nation? If the associations are displeased by the lack of studies in this emerging field, why are they stifling them instead of throwing their weight behind funding them? If IVF is more expensive, more painful, more time-consuming, and less effective, why would the major medical associations promote it? (There is an answer to this question, and I suspect it has little to do with women’s health and a lot to do with revenue.)

RRM is not yet the standard of care for women in the United States. But it is a hopeful, innovative, and cutting-edge field of women’s health research that the major medical associations appear to be undermining. Madeleine Kearns and her baby girl are living proof that Christian couples struggling with infertility have alternative options to IVF. Hopefully more couples will have the chance to pursue it.

The International Institute for Restorative Reproductive Medicine helps individuals find Restorative Reproductive Medicine (RRM) clinics here.