No link between IVF drugs and ovarian cancer

A new study has suggested that there is no proven link between fertility drugs and ovarian cancer. Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh reviewed eight studies carried out over a ten-year period in the United States, Denmark, Canada and Australia. The results, based on the largest number of women yet, showed that women who had taken fertility drugs in order to assist conception were no more likely to develop ovarian cancer than those who had not taken the drugs.
The study did show, however, that women who spent more than five years trying to get pregnant - regardless of whether they took fertility drugs or not - were much more likely to get ovarian cancer later in life. This finding suggests that it is the underlying fertility problem, rather than the treatment for it, which is to blame for the higher cancer risk. Particular causes of infertility, such as endometriosis, seem to carry a higher risk.