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Egg retrieval; dilemma about transfer
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Anonymous
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I'm 40 and have had two previous pregnancies at the first and third try (4 and 3 years ago), one ended in miscarriage, the other resulted in our first born. Had two failed IUIs over the last year and decided to go the IVF route. Had the egg retrieval today and had produced 11 eggs. We'll find out soon how many will fertilize. Now we're in the dilemma of how many embryos to transfer. We don't want twins; but we wouldn’t mind having three children (although it'll be a hard financial road to take). Anyway, read previous topic threads on the pros and cons of transferring one or more embryos. If we transfer only one embryo, we might risk not getting pregnant at all; I don't want to wait any longer. If we transfer 2, we might end up with twins. I'm wondering if my chances of having twins are greatly reduced now that I've turned 40. We're self-pay, so that is a factor as well. Don’t quite know what to do!
Any advice is appreciated. Thanks! |
Anonymous
| Honestly...being that you are 40 and are self pay (its unfortunate that $$ sometimes has to help with these types of decisions...I'm self pay too)...I would transfer 2, not 1. Also, your egg quality after fertilization may affect your decision so definitely discuss this more with your husband and RE. Maybe your RE can shed some light on the rates of multiples for your age. |
Anonymous
| I think you need to wait and see how the embryos progress and talk to your RE. There are no guarantees -- you could transfer just one embryo and still end up with identical twins. I think 2-3 is the norm for women in their early 40's. |
Anonymous
| I don't know which doctor you are using, but Shady Grove's success rate is virtually equal using one egg or two. Our doctor told us to do one, unless we were very, very comfortable with having twins. |
Anonymous
This is their stats with women under 35. 40 is a different story because the chance of having abormal eggs is much higher. |
Anonymous
| We're using Dr. Sachs at Columbia Fertility and we haven't consulted him yet. I turned 40 in January, so I know the stats are different than under 35. I myself conceived naturally and easily when I was 36 and 37. On the other hamd, we are not comfortable with having twins... |
Anonymous
I did not find this true at SG at all for women 40 +. Every dr I've seen there have always recommended transfering more than one egg for women over 40. I did four eggs each time and finally got pregnant the second time with one baby. I'm very glad we didn't transfer just one each time. |
Anonymous
| I think the SG recommendation for transferring just one embryo is mainly for 5 day transfers. We were a day 3 transfer and the RE doing the transfer strongly recommended that we transfer 2 even though it was our first IVF and I'm 32 (in those cases SART protocol is to "consider" transfering one embryo). |
Anonymous
| OP here. Thanks all for the information. My day 3 transfer is tomorrow; I had 9 mature eggs and 7 were fertilized without any assistance. I turned 40 in January and, while I don't want twins, I think we'll go for 2 embryos this time (and freeze the rest). I dread going through this again if it doesn't work out this time around. We'll see how it goes. Thanks again; wish me luck! |
Anonymous
| Wish you all the best! And, would love an update later. |
Anonymous
| Thanks so much! Turns out that it will be a day 5 transfer after all. All 7 embryos are in "excellent" shape and 3 are in the morula stage. RE said that on day 5 they should be able to see more clearly which ones are the best and, hopefully, transfer 2-3 blastocysts. He said that success rate at their clinic is almost twice as high with day 5 transfers than with day 3. I believe him but who knows if this will be true for us. Let's see how it goes. |