Methodology & the FertilityList Score
Last updated 2026-11-13
FertilityList is built from official, public data. This page explains where our numbers come from, how the FertilityList Score is calculated, and what it cannot tell you. The current score is version 1.0, computed from CDC reporting year 2022 and the two years before it.
Where the data comes from
US clinic data comes from the CDC National Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) Surveillance System. US clinics are required by federal law (the Fertility Clinic Success Rate and Certification Act of 1992) to report their ART cycles to the CDC. We use the CDC's "Final ART Summary" datasets for 2020, 2021, 2022, plus the "Services and Profiles" dataset, all published on data.cdc.gov as public-domain US government works.
- Final ART Summary 2022: https://data.cdc.gov/d/9tjt-seye
- Final ART Summary 2021: https://data.cdc.gov/d/24w5-nppr
- Final ART Summary 2020: https://data.cdc.gov/d/4yy2-qa9v
- Services and Profiles 2022: https://data.cdc.gov/d/ix4g-rt8v
Data last retrieved: 2026-11-13. CDC publishes final clinic data about two to three years after the treatment year, so 2022 is the most recent complete year available. We re-check for new releases every month.
We do not edit the CDC's figures. We display suppressed values (counts of 1–4) and small-denominator fractions exactly as the CDC publishes them, and we never convert a fraction into a percentage.
The FertilityList Score (1–5)
The score summarizes four components. Each is converted to a value between 0 and 1, combined with the weights below, and mapped to a 1.0–5.0 scale (score = 1 + 4 × weighted total).
| Component | Weight | What it measures |
|---|---|---|
| Age-adjusted outcomes | 50% | Live births per intended egg retrieval, own eggs, compared with the national rate for the clinic's own age mix. Expressed as a percentile among scored clinics. |
| Experience | 20% | Total ART cycles in 2022, on a logarithmic scale, as a percentile. Going from 50 to 500 cycles counts much more than going from 2,000 to 2,450. |
| Reporting consistency | 15% | Share of the last 3 CDC reporting years with data from the clinic. |
| Professional standards | 15% | SART membership (half) and verified embryology lab accreditation (half), as reported in the CDC dataset. |
Age adjustment
Success rates depend heavily on patient age. A clinic that treats mostly younger patients would look better than one treating many patients over 40, even with identical care. To correct for this, we compare each clinic's rate in each age group with the national rate for that same group. The national rates for 2022 are:
| Age | US live births per intended retrieval |
|---|---|
| Under 35 | 49.7% |
| 35–37 | 36.3% |
| 38–40 | 23.1% |
| Over 40 | 7.7% |
We then average those ratios, weighting each age group by the clinic's number of intended retrievals. A ratio of 1.00 means the clinic matched the national rate for its age mix.
Small-sample adjustment
A clinic with 12 retrievals and 8 births would show a 67% rate that is mostly luck. Before computing the ratio, we add 20 "pseudo-retrievals" at the national rate to each age group: adjusted rate = (births + 20 × national rate) ÷ (retrievals + 20). This barely changes large clinics and pulls small ones toward the average, so a clinic cannot rank first on a handful of cycles.
When a clinic gets no score
Clinics are shown as "Limited data" instead of with a score when they did not report outcomes for 2022, or when they reported fewer than 20 intended egg retrievals with comparable rates. Of 452 clinics that reported for 2022, 390 have a score.
What the score does not include
- Patient reviews. Google ratings and reviews are not part of the score. We link to each clinic's Google Maps listing so you can read them yourself.
- Price. The CDC does not collect prices.
- Payments. No clinic can pay to change its score or position. See our editorial policy.
Limitations
- The CDC itself cautions that comparing clinics may not be meaningful, because patient populations and treatment approaches differ (for example, how many patients with a poor prognosis a clinic accepts).
- Age is the only patient characteristic we adjust for. Diagnosis, prior treatment, and other factors are not in the adjustment.
- Data is two to three years old by the time the CDC publishes it. Staff, labs and protocols may have changed since.
- A rate tells you about a clinic's past patients, not your personal chance of success.
How we use AI
FertilityList is built and maintained with the help of AI tools, under automated quality checks. Data pages are generated directly from the source datasets; AI does not write or alter the numbers. Guides are drafted with AI assistance and must pass checks that require a citation for every statistic, flag medical-advice wording, and block duplicate content. See the editorial policy.
Reuse our data
Our processed dataset, including scores, is free to download under CC BY 4.0 from the open data page. Please credit "FertilityList (fertilitylist.com), based on CDC data".