LAURA Rush's birth was nothing short of a miracle for her parents after their lengthy struggle for a baby.

Now 23, Laura was one of the first "test-tube babies" created in a laboratory in Nottingham.

Her parents, Liz and Fred, of Lowdham, had been trying for a child for ten years, so it seemed the answer to their prayers when fertility experts Dr Simon Fishel and John Webster set up an IVF clinic at the Park Hospital in Arnold in 1985.

"They thought they would give it a go and they were pretty lucky, they got me on their first attempt," said Laura, a postgraduate student in Bristol.

Her mother's eggs were fertilised by her dad's sperm in a petri dish. The eggs were implanted in her mother's womb at 11.25am on January 1, 1986.

At that time there was still a huge stigma attached to IVF (in vitro fertilisation), now considered a fairly routine medical procedure.

Laura and her parents were special guests at the official opening of Care (Centres for Assisted Reproduction) Fertility's new state-of-the art centre at Nottingham Business Park in July 2006.

"I think IVF is incredible and with all the developments made recently it's giving more and more people the opportunity to have kids," said Laura.

Early pioneering IVF research began in Oldham, leading to the birth of the world's first test-tube baby, Louise Brown in 1978.

Mr Webster, a now-retired consultant gynaecologist, was involved in the early work and went on to assist fertility pioneer Patrick Steptoe at the delivery.

The world's first dedicated IVF unit, was set up in Cambridge in 1980, with Mr Webster deputy medical director. Dr Fishel joined the team the following year. It was an invitation to give a lecture at the City Hospital that first brought the duo to Nottingham.

A few months later, Mr Webster was asked by local obstetrician Tony Tyack to set up a fertility unit in the city.

While Mr Webster had the medical expertise, he needed a scientist to make it viable.

He invited Dr Fishel – who was on the cusp of leaving for New York – to join him.

"I thought 'Nottingham with John or New York with a bunch of guys I don't know? I will go with the devil I know'," said Dr Fishel.

Together with nurse Sue Quickmire and secretary Heather Palmer, they worked around the clock to establish the clinic.

IVF was developed to help women with blocked fallopian tubes to conceive but misunderstanding, suspicion and fear had muddied the waters since the 1970s. The church had accused scientists of meddling with nature.

"We had questions like 'what about the soul of the child, would that be intact and when a lady had twins following IVF, could the soul divide?' It was very serious at the time," said Mr Webster.

As scientists pushed the boundaries, a voluntary licensing authority emerged to set some regulations – a forerunner to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) which now licenses all UK clinics.

Dr Fishel had already been hauled over the coals in the early 1980s after the world's first twins were created with donor eggs.

"They couldn't find a donor for her so her sister volunteered and she had two boys," he said.

"I was pilloried in London by counsellors and sociologists for doing a known donation. They put a moratorium on it for ten years so only anonymous donors could be used but now that has all changed."

With each 'first' there was a stumbling block to overcome.

After Europe's first surrogacy – arranged in Nottingham – the woman who used a surrogate mum to carry her twins faced a battle with social services, which suggested she should adopt the babies. She argued that genetically they were her own children.

Dr Fishel faced a major obstacle in the late 1980s with his cutting-edge technology which would eventually revolutionise male infertility.

Intricate tools (12 times thinner than a strand of human hair) could pick a single sperm and inject it into an egg. Bear in mind a human egg is ten times smaller than a full stop and a sperm is 1,500 times smaller.

It was very good, very interesting but could he prove it was safe, demanded the interim licensing authority?

Without permission to test it with couples in the UK, Dr Fishel took his mission to Rome and the world's first baby using this technique was born to an Italian couple in 1990.

Before this procedure only five per cent of men with a fertility problem could have their own genetic child and 95% were offered donor sperm. Now it's the other way round.

Everything changed in the early 1990s after the creation of the HFEA and laws making IVF ethical, regulated and mainstream in the UK. And when an opportunity arose for Dr Fishel to pursue a dream of establishing a £500,000 university-run facility for training and research, he left the Park Hospital.

When Nurture (Nottingham University Research and Treatment Unit in Reproduction) opened in 1991, it combined a degree course dubbed "the creation of human life" for doctors and scientists around the world, research and treatment.

Dr Fishel returned to private practice in 1997 at Care Fertility at the Park Hospital, which has grown into one of the UK's largest IVF organisation.

Today Care operates from John Webster House, purpose-built facilities at Nottingham Business Park.

Dr Fishel remains at the forefront of research and was instrumental in a pioneering technique which last year saw a British woman become the first in the world to conceive after being screened for chromosomal abnormalities.

The mum of baby Oliver had previously suffered two miscarriages and 13 failed IVF courses.

But this time doctors were able to identify two eggs which had a good chance of leading to a successful pregnancy.

Dr Fishel estimates treatment at the Nottingham clinic has led to the birth of 10,000 babies.

lynette.pinchess@nottinghameveningpost.co.uk