NaproTechnology: Creating a Culture of Life Revolution
by Natalie Hudson

In our previous newsletter the feature item was the article on “What is Wrong With In Vitro Fertilization?”  It outlined the problem of infertility affecting some 600,000 individuals in Canada and the inadequacies of the current treatments, both ethically and medically.  Today, the medical profession’s response to frustrated couples that cannot conceive is little more than a puzzled shrug of the shoulders and directions to the nearest IVF clinic.  But the techniques used in IVF are seriously flawed.  They fail to address the overarching, fundamental question of infertility because they fail to cooperate with nature.  IVF methods override the natural processes altogether.  Many women have gone through the painful experience of multiple IVF cycles at exorbitant financial costs and still do not know what is causing their inability to conceive or carry children.

A shocking testimony against IVF has come out only recently by Lord Robert Winston, head of fertility at Hammersmith Hospital, London.  He surprised an audience at the British Association Festival of Science by saying that he felt IVF patients were being used as guinea pigs in fertility experiments. When asked whether IVF patients were being experimented on, he replied: "That's exactly what I am saying."  IVF patients, of necessity, surrender their bodies to an arrogant scientific process that shuts down the pituitary gland, one of the key “command” sites in the human body, and abrogates for itself the natural process of conception.

In contrast to the aberrations inherent in IVF are NaPro Technology® and the Creighton Model FertilityCare™ System.  The development of these natural procreation technologies began over 20 years ago with Drs. John and Lyn Billings, the Australian physicians who originally created the Billings Ovulation Method.  Since that time, researchers have worked at St. Louis University and Creighton University Schools of Medicine and most recently at the Pope Paul VI Institute for the Study of Human Reproduction (Omaha, Nebraska) to create a standardized modification of this system into what is now known as the Creighton Model FertilityCare™ System (CrMS).  

NaPro Technology®, is a system of medical science based on the CrMS. It devotes medical and surgical resources to cooperating with the natural procreative mechanisms and functions of the human reproductive system. For example, in an operation to remove ovarian cysts, surgeons trained in this technology will work within the natural cycle and use special surgical methods that are least likely to affect the surrounding tissue and organs.

The Creighton Model FertilityCare™ System (CrMS) allows women to chart their menstrual cycles using biological markers (bio-markers) that reflect the occurrence of various hormonal events during the course of the cycle. It actually allows a woman to unravel the "mysteries of her menstrual cycle."  The charting provides both the woman and her physician vital information regarding her natural fertility.

Such problems as infertility, repetitive miscarriage, recurrent ovarian cysts, endometriosis, premenstrual syndrome, a variety of different hormonal abnormalities, the effects of stress, the causes of abnormal bleeding and correctly dating the estimated time of conception can all be determined from these records.  Once the Creighton Model evaluation of the menstrual cycle has documented the occurrence of symptoms with regard to their timing within the post-ovulatary (luteal) phase of the cycle, it can also be used to accurately time treatments. One treatment that has been effective in some clinical practices is post-ovulatory progesterone supplementation. Rather than the standard treatment for many of these gynecologic conditions, which is oral contraceptives, or in some cases, Depo-Provera, cooperative progesterone replacement therapy will correct the body’s imbalances without the side effects of hormonal contraceptives.  Most importantly, this treatment will preserve and/or restore the normal menstrual cycle including fertility.

How accurate are these methods?  Once the patient understands her own fertility patterns, certain tests can be timed to the appropriate parts of the cycle with high accuracy.  This step alone will frequently result in the couple achieving pregnancy. Of couples referred to the Fertility Care center at Omaha for inability to achieve pregnancy (for an average of 3 years), 20-40% have achieved pregnancy within six months of use of the CrMS, before any further medical evaluation and treatment was undertaken . The use effectiveness of the Creighton Model to avoid pregnancy has been well studied and documented. When used to avoid pregnancy, the method-related pregnancy rate was less than 1%. Accounting for user error, the pregnancy rate was less than 5% .

At the Marguerite Bourgeois Fertility Care conference held in Toronto this summer (July 16-19), doctors from around the world gathered to compare notes on the remarkable successes of these natural technologies.  Dr. Phil Boyle has dedicated his practice to the Creighton Model FertilityCare System.  He practices in Ireland and shared some of the remarkable success stories he has had with this system. Couples who had run the course of IVF technologies and were left puzzling over their seemingly hopeless situation were pregnant in less than 12 months under his care.  A great majority of the causes of infertility are simply imbalances in hormonal levels detected by the process of charting.

What do these natural methods promise? Nothing short of a culture of life revolution.  Dr. Tracy Parnell, a family practitioner in Cranbrook, BC and medical consultant for FertilityCare, maintains that NaPro Technology®, and the Creighton Model FertilityCare™ System have the potential to bring about a profound understanding and reverence for the natural and God-given miracle of human fertility.  She believes that it will not only make artificial contraception and in vitro fertilization techniques undesirable but it will expose the deficiencies of these methods.  Once couples begin to comprehend and appreciate the intricacies of the reproductive system, the very ideas of artificial contraception and abortion become unthinkable.
 
Natural procreative technologies maintain the integrity of the human person by taking into account the unique cyclical patterns that exist in “this particular” woman. They not only respect the dignity of the woman, but are supportive of the institution of marriage as they allow couples to cooperate through the mutual understanding of their reproductive systems.  Procreative and gynecologic health problems can be approached in a way that is completely cooperative with the menstrual and fertility cycles, and in a way that is morally and ethically acceptable.

More information is available on-line through the American Academy of FertilityCare Professionals at www.aafcp.org and through the Margarite Bourgeoys Family Center, Coxwell Medical Building, Suite 100, 688 Coxwell Avenue, Toronto; 416-465-2868.