Pauline Lyon lied to doctors to enable her to undergo the in vitro fertilisation treatment which resulted in the birth of a daughter, Lauren, a month before her 52nd birthday.

Mrs Lyon, from March, Cambridgeshire, gave birth to a boy at Hinchingbrooke Hospital, Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, on Monday after undergoing similar IVF treatment. She will be 56 later this month.

A spokeswoman for Hinchingbrooke Hospital said that Mrs Lyon had given birth to a 5lb 12oz boy.

She said mother and baby were both doing well.

Mrs Lyon has a 27-year-old daughter from her first marriage.

In September after news emerged that she was pregnant again, Mrs Lyon said she and her husband David, a prison officer, had wanted a second child to keep three-year-old Lauren company.

"We thought it would be nice for her (Lauren) to have a little brother or sister conceived in exactly the same way to play with and grow up with," she said when interviewed in September.

"And I feel healthy enough to have one. I don't feel any different from when I had my first child."

Mrs Lyon said she would not have continued further fertility treatment beyond the age of 56.

Doctor delighted

Professor Ian Craft, director of the London Gynaecology and Fertility Centre in Harley Street, London, where Mrs Lyon was treated said he was "highly delighted" by the news.

Speaking last September, Professor Craft defended his clinic's decision to give her fertility treatment.

"They have a beautiful little girl and we felt it was right for them to be given the chance to have a brother or sister for her," he said.

"We will treat women up to 55 - we don't see why a woman should be discriminated against because of her age when there is no problem with older men fathering babies. This is a wonderful, positive story."

Mrs Lyon is now the second oldest woman in Britain to be given successful test tube treatment.