The scientific output of a Catholic university department of obstetrics and gynecology.

The introduction of in-vitro fertilization (IVF) and prenatal diagnostics (PND) raised moral and ethical problems for Catholic universities. As expected, reproductive medicine research output was very low in departments that did not provide these facilities. It can be demonstrated that, by initiating IVF and PND under strong restrictions, a low scientific output in IVF and PND can be compensated for by increasing scientific output in new areas such as maternofetal physiology, primary prevention of birth defects and preconception care (folic acid and neural tube defects). This increase was mainly due to multidisciplinary efforts.