Beautiful twins born at Oxford's John Radcliffe Hospital are the first babies conceived using a revolutionary fertility treatment.

The boy, weighing 6lb 11oz, and girl, 5lb 14oz, were born on Thursday, October 18, by Caesarean section, nine months after their mother underwent In Vitro Maturation (IVM).

The procedure is similar to In Vitro Fertilisation (IVF), where a woman's eggs are extracted and fertilised by doctors, but is safer and cheaper.

In IVM, women do not need to take drugs to stimulate production of mature eggs in their ovaries, and instead, surgeons can remove younger eggs which are then matured in a Petri dish before being fertilised with sperm.

As a result, the process is cheaper, as couples do not have to pay for £1,000-a-time stimulation drugs, and women are not at risk from a side effect called ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome, which can lead to hospitalisation and even death.

The twins' parents, who live in Oxfordshire but do not want to be identified, received treatment at the Oxford Fertility Unit, a private clinic at the JR's women's centre.

Run by Oxford University researchers, it is the only UK centre with permission from the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority to carry out IVM.

Oxford University senior fellow in reproductive medicine and consultant gynaecologist Tim Child said: "Both parents are delighted and mum's doing fine at the moment. They'd been trying for children for a couple of years and this was their first fertility treatment. We gave them the choice of IVF or IVM.

"This shows the Oxford Fertility Unit is always keen to develop and offer cutting edge fertility treatments. We're in a position to offer more choice to couples and offer safer, simpler and cheaper treatments."