Fertility from the Inside Out

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

Cleveland Clinic performs first uterus transplant in the U.S.

A team of surgeons at the Cleveland Clinic performed the first uterus transplant in the United States this week.

This is a breakthrough for women who have uterine function disorders that could otherwise not carry their own child.

[bloodbreadovum]

One Sperm Donor, 150 Offspring

Cynthia Daily and her partner used a sperm donor to conceive a baby seven years ago, and they hoped that one day their son would get to know some of his half siblings — an extended family of sorts for modern times.

So Ms. Daily searched a Web-based registry for other children fathered by the same donor and helped to create an online group to track them. Over the years, she watched the number of children in her son’s group grow.

And grow.

Today there are 150 children, all conceived with sperm from one donor, in this group of half siblings, and more are on the way.

Ms. Kramer, the registry’s founder, said that one sperm donor on her site learned that he had 70 children. He now keeps track of them all on an Excel spreadsheet. “Every once in a while he gets a new kid or twins,” she said. “It’s overwhelming, and not what he signed up for. He was promised low numbers of children.”

Experts are not certain what it means to a child to discover that he or she is but one of 50 children — or even more. “Experts don’t talk about this when they counsel people dealing with infertility,” Ms. Kramer said. “How do you make connections with so many siblings? What does family mean to these children?”

I, personally, feel uncomfortable with donors calling donor-conceived offspring their children. That kind of phrasing strikes me as really delegitimizing and invalidating to families with donor-conceived children. Nonetheless, I can understand how overwhelming it must feel to know there are could be over a hundred people running around with your genes, especially if you weren’t given a proper warning for that potential outcome.

[hermountainsoul-deactivated2017]

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

As IVF Coordinator at the clinic, it is my job to manage all of our IVF and FET patients.  It’s been slightly overwhelming with the new OHIP coverage for IVF, but we’ve been motoring through, and we’ve had some pretty good pregnancy rates. 

There is a slight misrepresentation of the pregnancy rates because we’ve put some patients through the funded IVF program even though they didn’t have great prognosis. IVF is their last shot at achieving pregnancy.  Despite this, I’m pretty happy with the results that we’ve gotten so far. 

We also have come across this new protocol for Frozen Embryo Transfers, without divulging too much information, we give an injection on day 3 of progesterone, and we transfer the embryo on day 5. We’ve had some pretty awesome results. 

100% of patients had (+) BHCG, 80% of patients have ongoing clinical pregnancy with FHR. So i’m pretty happy about it.  The protocol actually came from one of our patients, she came across a medical journal from overseas that did the same study in their clinic.  They reported ~20% increase in (+) BHCG and ~20% Clinical pregnancy. 

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

There’s the really great app

in the app store by EMD Serono called Trymester. 

It’s an app that I’ve been recommending to my patients, unfortunately, it’s only available for tablets.  They are currently working on the mobile platform, but for now, it is limited to tablet users. 

This app provides patients with helpful information that is completely factual and tailored to your demographics. The app also includes a cycle tracker, notes section, and a really cool feature that finds the closest fertility clinic to you as well as direct links to that clinic’s website. 

Anyways, just wanted everyone to be aware of this app, check it out!

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

OHIP coverage for IVF

Ontario will begin to cover one IVF cycle for women under the age of 43 beginning in December. We had a phone conference the other night with the ministry of health. All of the clinics in Ontario were invited to listen in and ask questions. One of the questions that was answered was how many people will OHIP cover for IVF? There will be a cap for each clinic. Every individual clinic will prioritize their patients for who will receive IVF first. Because our clinic doesn't have its own IVF lab (we use a clinic that is located in the GTA) we will be included under their cap for IVF.

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

So Ontario will begin to cover one cycle of IVF starting in December

Everyone has been phoning the clinic asking about it. Here's what I know: 1. Four thousand people a year in Ontario will be funded for IVF. 2. Funding will start December 2015. 3. Ontario will pay for your first IVF procedure and all subsequent frozen embryo transfers (FETs) What I don't know: 1. Will they pay for medications that are associated with IVF? 2. What happens when they reach 4000 people?

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

At my clinic we’re on a roll for getting couples pregnant, and I’m super excited about it. :D

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

I think infertility is one of the saddest things ever

[friendship-distances]

[overheard-at-school]

So when you have a sperm donor, do you drink it?

(via overheard-at-school)

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

What's everyone's opinion on known donor/co-parenting vs. Donors from a sperm bank?

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

But what about a natural cycle?

Here’s the big question about non-medicated cycles vs. medicated cycles.

Many couples would prefer to have a natural cycle that does not have any help from medications or injections. We do try to accomodate the patient

Sometimes we do get results with natural cycles, however many of the patients that I see frequently have fertility problems that are better treated with medication, whether it’s a gonadotropin or serophene.

In a perfect world, we could just track ovulation and send couples on their merry way to have intercourse and then come back in 2 weeks for a pregnancy test.  But unfortunately, that is not always the case.

[fertilityfromtheinsideout]

I’ve made the bridge over

into fertility nursing. It’s an entirely different world. I find it extremely rewarding, it’s nice to help people have children. There’s definitely a downside, miscarriages, negative pregnancy tests, questions that health care providers really can’t answer. But so far, I’m really enjoying it.

[atx-nerd-mom]

We have this convention of not announcing a pregnancy until the high-risk first three months have passed; the only reason for it is to maintain a cult of silence around the possibility of miscarriage. But what we’re protecting is not the couple who suffers the miscarriage, but the world around them, which under cover of respecting private grief clings on to an infantile squeamishness around the particulars of reproduction.

With miscarriage, there are many routes to shame | Zoe Williams | Comment is free | The Guardian

I just have to point out that miscarriage is the ONLY time you’re expected to grieve privately. You lose a baby, a child, an adult in the prime of life, an elderly person, you usually have a very public mourning period. People offer up their condolences. Neighbors bring food and come to be with you in your grief. There are viewings, wakes, church services, grave-side services, celebrations of life. You have a miscarriage, though, and everyone expects you to keep your loss and your sadness to yourself. Bringing it up is gauche and uncomfortable, and god forbid you have feelings about it that someone else might have to deal with. It makes me so fucking angry.

(via atx-mom)