Stimulated IVF - Dominion Fertility or Shady Grove in Fairfax?

[Anonymous]

I recently failed on Natural Cycle IVF with Dr. Gordon at Dominion. I am 32 with no apparent health problems and my husband is 33 with male factor. Because our health insurance does not cover fertility treatments of any kind (we are cash paying patients) we tried NCIVF because the cost was only $4000 and we were told we're "good candidates." The entire procedure went very smoothly (monitoring, egg retrieval, fertilization w/ICSI, 3-day transfer) but unfortunately it resulted in no pregnancy.

We're leaning towards stimulated IVF, however, we're not sure if we should stay at Dominion (we love Dr. Gordon) or go to Shady Grove in Fairfax with Dr. Greenhouse (we had a consult and also liked him). Stimulated IVF at Dominion is more expensive than at Shady Grove but I'm not sure of their real differences.

Anyone have experience with stimulated IVF at either Dominion or Shady Grove and could share their experience with me?

Thanks so much in advance!

[Anonymous]

WOuld you consider trying natural IVF again? Perhaps a second time would work rather than go straight to hormone stimulated IVF.

[Anonymous]

My GYN recommended both Dr. Greenhouse and Dr. Gordon. We really liked both Drs. but decided to go with Dr. Greenhouse at Shady Grove. Personally, I know more people that have had success at Shady Grove vs. Dominion (4 vs. 1) but have heard good things about both clinics. We have limited insurance and will have to pay partially out of pocket for our 1st IVF treatment and ongoing treatments if necessary and Shady Grove was less expensive. We are just about to start our 1st stimulated IVF. I don't think you can go wrong with either choice. Whatever choice you make I wish you luck and success!

[Anonymous]

Thank you so much for your responses. They are extremely helpful and I appreciate everyone's time/feedback.

We're definitely going to talk to Dr. Gordon about doing another round of NCIVF vs. stimulated IVF...maybe first do some additional testing of my uterine lining (endometrial biopsy) just to make sure I am as "healthy" as the Drs and screening tests say I am before we make a decision about next steps. I feel like I have something wrong with me, we just haven't found it yet. (Why didn't the "perfect 8-cell" embryo stick?) NCIVF is such a SIMPLE procedure, it was almost too simple! I should have known it wouldn't work for me!

If stimulated IVF looks like our best option, I have a feeling we will have to go back to SG strictly because of financial reasons. I LOVE Dominion and Dr. Gordon, it breaks my heart not to work with them for stimulated but its almost a $5000 difference in price and that could cover the cost of our meds if we went to SG. But it sounds like SG is a good choice as well, with good success rates.

Thank you again for your input!

[Anonymous]

If you don't have fertility coverage you might also want to consider shared risk. I know Shady Grove has a shared risk program (can't remember if Dominion does).

[Anonymous]

I am 14 weeks pregnant after IVF with Greenhouse, so I am a big fan of his! Both my doctor and my husband's doctor each recommended him-- neither knew the other told us to go to him. He is amazingly compassionate, kind and an excellent doctor.

[Anonymous]

with a natural IVF cycle does that mean they just monitor you and then remove the one egg once you ovulate, fertilize it and then do the transfer?

[Anonymous]

Yes, you are correct. NCIVF consists of daily monitoring ---the office is open 24/7 (usually beginning on day 7 of your cycle), then you give yourself an HCG trigger shot approximately two days before you ovulate; you then come into the office right before you ovulate for the egg retrieval...they take the egg that your own body selected naturally (they can usually tell early on which egg its going to be because they will see it growing larger than the others), they fertilize the egg with ICSI, wait for it to grow for 3 days (hopefully to an 8-cell) and then you come back into the office with a full bladder and the Dr puts the fertilized embryo back into your body...then its onto the dreaded 2ww (you take progesterone, estrogen and baby aspirin during that time). Its such a simple process and virtually painless...the nurses give you step by step instructions so you always know what you need to do and waht is coming next. No anesthesia is needed, I only took 10mg of valium (fun!) I had very minor cramping afterwards. Getting my tonsils taken out was a worse process for me in my opinion!

Even though NCIVF didnt work for me the first time around (I think its about a 25% success rate per cycle), its definitely worth a try if you are self pay (its $4000 vs $15k-$20K), are under age 35 and healthy, didn't respond to stimulated IVF, you aren't comfortable taking fertility meds, and/or male factor is your biggest issue. I've met three women in Dr Gordon's office where NCIVF worked for them the first time...

I know people either love Dominion (usually because of Dr Gordon) or they hate Dominion (usually because of Dr. Dimattina) but these guys really know their stuff (it takes a great amount of expertise to do this NCIVF procedure)and their staff is WONDERFUL ...if you need handholding ( I do) then see Dr Gordon...if you don't and don't mind the arrogance, then see Dr Dimattina. He is actually not that big of a jerk as people make him out to be. I am super sensitive and I didn't get that impression from him. Also, read their book..."100 Q&As About Infertility"...it has a lot great information about fertility issues and the various treatment options available...helpful to skim through before you meet with your RE...you'll be better prepared to ask good questions!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am 14 weeks pregnant after IVF with Greenhouse, so I am a big fan of his! Both my doctor and my husband's doctor each recommended him-- neither knew the other told us to go to him. He is amazingly compassionate, kind and an excellent doctor.

CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR PREGNANCY! Its so refreshing to read about a success! You have definitely given me hope!

Questions: Did you get pregnant on your first cycle of IVF with Dr Greenhouse? May I ask how old you are and what your fertility issues were? What kinds of medications do they have you take? (I educated myself so much on NCIVF that I'm still learning more about stimulated since it may be our next step)

Thank you in advance!

[Anonymous]

I am 32, I have PCOS and had several miscarriages, but we were basically diagnosed with "unknown" problems. I responded beautifully to 3 IUI cycles, but they never resulted in a pregnancy (miscarriages came from clomid). We finally decided after many, many months of pondering to go for IVF and to do the shared risk program-- I couldn't face spending money and never getting it back, if the cycle didn't work.

I got pregnant on my very first try, by using follistim (left over from previous IUI cycle), menopur, and gonal-f. One of my ovaries went into hiding the day of retrieval, so they were only able to eggs our of my left ovary. They got 14. 10 were mature. 6 fertilized. 2 were perfect blastocysts the day of transfer, they gave us a choice of transferring one or two, we chose 2. 2 embryos didn't mature. We frozed the final 2, which became blastocysts on day 6. Transfer was Friday, I hardly left my couch until Sunday. "Cheated" and took a home test on Tuesday and found out I was pregnant. A week or two later, we found out we were having twins.

I began progesterone and baby asprin after the transfer and now I am only taking prenatals at 14 weeks!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am 32, I have PCOS and had several miscarriages, but we were basically diagnosed with "unknown" problems. I responded beautifully to 3 IUI cycles, but they never resulted in a pregnancy (miscarriages came from clomid). We finally decided after many, many months of pondering to go for IVF and to do the shared risk program-- I couldn't face spending money and never getting it back, if the cycle didn't work.

I got pregnant on my very first try, by using follistim (left over from previous IUI cycle), menopur, and gonal-f. One of my ovaries went into hiding the day of retrieval, so they were only able to eggs our of my left ovary. They got 14. 10 were mature. 6 fertilized. 2 were perfect blastocysts the day of transfer, they gave us a choice of transferring one or two, we chose 2. 2 embryos didn't mature. We frozed the final 2, which became blastocysts on day 6. Transfer was Friday, I hardly left my couch until Sunday. "Cheated" and took a home test on Tuesday and found out I was pregnant. A week or two later, we found out we were having twins.

I began progesterone and baby asprin after the transfer and now I am only taking prenatals at 14 weeks!

Thank you so much for sharing your story, you have no idea how much its helped and given me hope (we are the same age and I was also diagnosed with "unknown" problems = so frustrating!). I think you were so smart to do the shared risk program, its something I'm trying to convince my husband that we should do if we do stimulated IVF (instead of trying NCIVF again). I can't imagine not getting my $$ back if the cycle didn't work as well.

Congratulations on your twins! That is such wonderful news! Wishing you a happy pregnancy and a happy life afterwards! Thank you again!

[Anonymous]

My husband was the one who wanted to do shared risk even more than me at first. His reasoning was that if we didn't do it and we didn't get pregnant, he would be angry that we "wasted" all that money and we would never see a dime of it again. However, if we did it and got pregnant we would be so thrilled about the baby/babies, we would be okay to with "wasting" the extra money, if it worked on the first try. He was right, I don't regret doing shared risk for even a second. It also took a lot of pressure off the cycle, I was worried enough about the medical things, it was nice to have the financial things settled.

We got a good loan through Capital One Health Care loans --at 1.99%, which helped ease the pain of shelling out the money all at once.

[Anonymous]

One thing to keep in mind with Shared Risk is that you have to qualify. I was 31 when we started IVF and was dismayed to find that I didn't qualify. I had stage IV endo, and one blood test that showed slightly elevated FSH; I also ended up being a poor responder to fertility drugs. It was very upsetting to be rejected -but I did end up getting pregnant on my first full round of IVF (following one canceled cycle).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My husband was the one who wanted to do shared risk even more than me at first. His reasoning was that if we didn't do it and we didn't get pregnant, he would be angry that we "wasted" all that money and we would never see a dime of it again. However, if we did it and got pregnant we would be so thrilled about the baby/babies, we would be okay to with "wasting" the extra money, if it worked on the first try. He was right, I don't regret doing shared risk for even a second. It also took a lot of pressure off the cycle, I was worried enough about the medical things, it was nice to have the financial things settled.

We got a good loan through Capital One Health Care loans --at 1.99%, which helped ease the pain of shelling out the money all at once.

Thank you so much for this very helpful information! I am totally on the same page as your husband and it looks like my hubby is getting there too after reading your post. It's so good to hear that you can do the shared risk program via the Capital One Health Care Loan! Something we will definitely look into. I hope we will get approval for both programs...other than my husband's "borderline" poor sperm analysis, we don't have any other health issues (that the Drs could find) I'm 32 and my husband is 33 so we should at least meet their age requirement. I feel terrible that the poster above had issues getting approved for the program. Infertility is unfair enough!