NHS Referral accepted but BMI issue… has anyone experienced the same???

[Lata7384]

Finally after 5 years fertility treatment at NHS , the Consultant offered me ivf but the criteria said my BMI should be 30 and my husband should be 35. I have looked into the criteria of HFEA, it says the bmi should be 35 for a woman, nothing mention about man. My current bmi is 33.1 and did 1 cycle privately and met the criteria as by BMI . Very upset but am happy that my next appointment is in 4 months time, enough time to work on myself but my husband is far overweight and cannot drop 30kg to meet the nhs criteria 😞😞

[Westcoastwestie]

Is this from your NHS area guidelines or general? If it is general maybe have a look at your local guidelines. I remember it had criteria for me but I don’t remember it having criteria for my husband. But we are using a donor so maybe I didn’t focus on it too much.

Also, with many doctors I think if they can see there is a genuine effort to meet that criteria that might make a judgement call. I wouldn’t worry about all being lost. So many of my appointments have been video call if it wasn’t for the egg collection I don’t think my husband would have been in the clinic.

[SK73]

Hi there, really great news about your funding!! I had something similar, was told BMI needed to be below 30 for myself. I lost some weight and then could start. They didn't care about my husband's though. If you've read up on HFEA maybe send an email and point this out. Be really interested to read what you've found if you have a link?

[Babysteps22]

Hiya, I was also told both mine and my husband's BMI had to be below 30 before we could be referred to the fertility clinic under NHS funding. My BMI was 33.3 and I managed to drop to 29.4 in 6 months. My husband was already under 30 for his bmi so no worry there. We had 2 separate appointments with the NHS where we both had to be weighed and we wouldn't get referred to the fertility clinic unless our BMI was under 30, they were very strict about this, but I guess other clinics might differ. Wishing you all the best x

[Sian_K]

This happened to me and my Husband. We were referred for NHS IVF after trying for 5 years, when we got to our first appointment to fill in at the paperwork, they took one look at my Husband and said his BMI is too high and we never should have got to that stage. They were very apologetic, but we were heartbroken. My BMI is below 30, but he is 6ft 4 so hasn’t had a low BMI since he was about 14. Unfortunately it is a postcode lottery, it depends on your local CCG. If we lived in the next County it wouldn’t be an issue!! So I feel your pain. Fast forward 3 years and we are currently undergoing our 1st round of private IVF!

[Boo718]

The bmi is a load of crap. I honestly think they do it to whittle down patients. We started with the nhs I lost 5 stone but couldn’t get the bmi down enough. I needed to get to 10 and a half I got to 11. They wouldn’t take me. We went private and they said the worst thing I could have done was lose so much weight so fast now my hormonal levels are all over the place. The private clinics have not weighed us once. They said it has absolutely nothing to do with bmi. You can have a bmi of 25 but eat nothing but processed crap. She was more interested in us having a good diet xxx