South Pole Adventurer is helping couples overcome infertility in Milton Keynes

Ed Coats is heading up the Milton Keynes arm of Oxford Fertility att Whaddon Medical Centre in Bletchley.

Oxford Fertility offers IVF, ICSI, Frozen Embryo Transer and a range of other fertility treatments for women struggling to conceive.

Ed, who is a dad of three, is former GB track and field decathlete who competed in the race to the South Pole for BBC2’s ‘On Thin Ice programme. He also jointly led a ski expedition to the Geographic North Pole for Channel 5’s ‘North Pole Ice Airport’, and has completed various adventure races, including swimming the English Channel.

But his day job is helping couples conceive. With degrees in Medicine and Human and Aerospace Physiology from the University of London and a Medical Law degree, he undertook specialist training in Obstetrics and Gynaecology in the South-West of England and completed his Doctor of Medicine (MD) at the University of Nottingham.

He has won national and international awards, is widely published and is regularly asked to write for books on fertility.

Oxford Fertility's MK satellite clinic opened in 2018 and gives NHS and private patients access to the broadest range of fertility treatment in the UK. It reduces the stress and inconvenience of travelling to appointments.

The clinic has helped numerous couples, including Arezou, 34, and Vahid, 37, from Milton Keynes, who had struggled to conceive for years. Following t by Ed’s team, they welcomed their miracle daughter, Janan, into the world this summer.

Arezou said “The team at the clinic were brilliant, everything was perfect. Our daughter Janan was born in June this year and we feel so blessed. She is full of energy, is healthy and is absolutely gorgeous!”

“We can’t thank the team enough. We would encourage anyone who is uncertain about their fertility to reach out for help. You may be fit and healthy, but you may need treatment to help conceive.

"Like us, a third of people who undergo IVF have ‘unexplained infertility’. After years of trying with no success, we are truly thankful we took the steps to receive help and now have our baby Janan."

Meanwhile, Ed is giving Citizen readers the following tips on how to improve their fertility and spot if they are experiencing problems:

How to improve your fertility

We spend a lot of our early adult years learning to avoid getting pregnant. But we should also spend time understanding our fertility health, especially as a society we’re leaving it later to start building our families.

Last year, the average age of a mother was almost 31 years and for dads it was nearly 34 years. This is important, as the most common reason for a decline in fertility is still age. Once over thirty five, one-third of women experience fertility problems, rising to two-thirds when over forty. This

tends to be because the number and quality of the eggs in the ovaries declines.

That said, the influence of age varies for each person, and there are other causes for infertility, such as male factor, ovulatory disorders, blocked fallopian tubes and endometriosis. Lifestyle also has a big role to play in our fertility, and so you can make changes to your life to improve your fertility.

Three essential areas to optimise:

1. Be the right weight – Especially for women, weight has a significant role to play. Being underweight or overweight can impact your fertility. Aim for between 19-30 BMI.

2. Stop smoking – Most smokers want to quit and this will give you another reason. Nicotine, even in passive smoking, reduces fertility in both men and women. It can take longer to conceive and doubles the chances of suffering a miscarriage.

3. Be cautious vaping – as its new, there aren’t too many studies around vaping and fertility, but some have shown that bubblegum and cinnamon-flavour have the worst impact on the number, motility and maturity of sperm.

Lots of people are concerned that their diet or feeling stressed is impacting their fertility. But these are two areas you can stop worrying about. In the UK our food is packed with added vitamins, changes to your diet won’t make a significant difference to your fertility. Also research has shown that stress doesn’t make a difference to your chances of conception.

How do you spot if you are experiencing problems?

To maximise your chances of conceiving, it’s best to have unprotected sex every two or three days through the cycle, from the end of your period to the beginning of the next one. If you have been trying for a year with no success, it may be time to see your GP. They can refer you

to a fertility clinic to undergo tests.

You should also go to your GP if you are experiencing symptoms of conditions that could impact your fertility later on. For example, endometriosis affects one in ten women, and yet takes eight years to diagnose.

So if you experience heavy and painful periods or abnormal bleeding, painful bowel motions or pain when passing urine or discomfort during intercourse, please see your GP. There is no link between the number of symptoms and severity of pain and the extent of your endometriosis. But the earlier

it’s spotted, the better your chances of overcoming infertility.

A growing number of people not quite ready to start their brood, are now also taking fertility tests to understand their fertility health. After two appointments they are armed with an accurate picture of their fertility and so know if any steps are needed to be taken to preserve future family plans.