Elizabeth Mucci, naturopath, herbalist and scientist from Life on the Inside, joins me to chat about fertility and infertility (both male and female), preconception health and IVF. Elizabeth provides some really clear suggestions for tests and simple life changes. A must listen for anyone that is thinking about or has had children.

Selected Links from the Episode

Elizabeth Mucci, Life on the Inside

Unstress episodes with Nicole Bijslma and Professor Marc Cohen on environmental toxins

Unstress episode with Kate Powe on endometriosis

Unstress episode with Dr. Ross Walker on cardiovascular health

Unstress episode with Dr. Gary Fettke on insulin resistance

Unstress episode with Dr. Terry Wahls on food as medicine

Download the PDF transcription

Dr. Ron Ehrlich:           Hello and welcome to “Unstress”. This is Dr. Ron Ehrlich. Now today's subject is something which definitely has touched every person listening to this podcast. In fact, every person not listening. It's about fertility it's something we take for granted until we decide that it's time when we decide in fact to have children. Well, actually there are times when it just happens so perhaps that's the subject of another podcast but anyway about fertility. We take it for granted until things don't actually go as planned. And infertility is an issue that affects well, some estimates put it at one in six which is about 17% of the population of those trying to get pregnant of course. Now that changes with age. Another estimate puts the figure at about one in five and the numbers increase to one in three for women over 35.

Now, by the way, it isn't just older women fuelling the growth of infertility services, that's for sure. Male infertility is a factor. Well, again estimates vary but it's between 25 to 40 and even some have higher cases up to 60% of failures or difficulties to conceive. There are in fact some studies show male infertility is even bigger than that, up to about 60% as I said and it's a growing problem. It's also big business with IVF in vitro fertilization costing around a half a billion. That's 500 million dollars per year in Australia alone. And in the USA that figure is up to 3.5 billion.

Now without casting any aspersions here on those organizations, a good business model, of course, is one having some success that means successful births but not necessarily first go because each attempt can cost between ten and twenty thousand dollars and that includes the procedure, accompanying tests and medications.

So, today we wanted to focus on fertility- what you should be considering. And some of the things aren't necessarily obvious or even brought to the attention of some IVF patients or clients.

My guest today is naturopath Elizabeth Mucci. Now Elizabeth Mucci is a scientist and nutritionist, a herbalist. She has a master's in reproductive medicine and over 17 years of experience as a clinician and a teacher. Elizabeth Mucci has literally helped thousands of patients start their families and most of these patients have been facing some particularly challenging fertility issues that may have also included some multiple miscarriages or also repeat IVF attempts. The combination of Elizabeth Mucci's education in science, nutrition herbal medicine and reproductive medicine along with her close work with a number of Sydney's top fertility specialists have provided her with and as you will hear a unique perspective on hormonal and reproductive health. I hope you enjoyed this conversation I had with Elizabeth Mucci.

Download the PDF transcription

Welcome to the show Elizabeth Mucci.

Elizabeth Mucci:          Hi.

Dr. Ron Ehrlich:           Now, Elizabeth Mucci at some point in most not all of our lives, the issue of having children seems like a good idea. You know keeping the species going passing on the family line having a go yourself and often we assume we just need to make a decision to have children and then it j...