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Hum. Reprod. Advance Access published online on December 17, 2008
Human Reproduction, doi:10.1093/humrep/den455
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© The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Information processing, attention and visual-motor function of adolescents born after in vitro fertilization compared with spontaneous conception

K. Wagenaar1,4, M.M. van Weissenbruch2, D.L. Knol3, P.T. Cohen-Kettenis1, H.A. Delemarre-van de Waal2 and J. Huisman1

1 Department of Medical Psychology, VU University Medical Center, PO Box 7057, 1007 MB Amsterdam, The Netherlands 2 Department of Pediatrics, VU University Medical Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands 3 Department of Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Institute for Clinical and Experimental Neurosciences, VU University Medical Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

4 Correspondence address. Tel: +31-20-4440861; Fax: +31-20-4440851; E-mail: k.wagenaar{at}vumc.nl

BACKGROUND: Adverse conditions during prenatal life are associated with changes in physical and mental functioning in later life, as shown in children born preterm or small for gestational age. While recently in IVF children cardiometabolic differences have been demonstrated, there might also be risks for disturbance in cognitive functions. Therefore, this study examined information processing, attention and visual-motor function in pubertal IVF children compared with spontaneously conceived controls from subfertile parents. Results of these cognitive functions were then related to cardiometabolic measures to explore whether both can be explained by changes in fetal programming due to IVF.

METHODS: A total of 139 IVF and 143 control adolescents underwent various neuropsychological tests to measure information processing, attention and visual-motor function. The results were then related to data on blood pressure and glucose levels previously obtained from the same groups.

RESULTS: No differences between IVF and control adolescents were found in the various test results for information processing and attention. A slight difference was found between the groups for motor speed, but these scores were within the normal range for the test. No direct relation was found between cognitive measures and cardiometabolic outcome.

CONCLUSIONS: Comparison of IVF adolescents and controls revealed no disturbances in information processing, attention and visual-motor function. In addition, these cognitive functions were not directly related to cardiometabolic outcome. Therefore, these results do not support the hypothesis that cognition is influenced by IVF conception or an altered programming of metabolic systems due to IVF, and indicate that cognitive abilities in IVF children, as measured by the tasks assessed, appear to develop normally.

Key words: adolescents/attention/information processing/IVF/visual-motor function

Submitted on April 7, 2008; resubmitted on November 10, 2008; accepted on November 15, 2008.


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