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IVF cost too high? Best IVF protocols & tips to reduce IVF cost w/o hurting IVF success - YouTube
Channel: Infertility TV
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There is no doubt that IVF is the best
fertility treatment with the highest
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pregnancy rate. However, IVF is also the
most expensive fertility treatment.
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There are ways that you can reduce some IVF costs and make it more affordable stay tuned.
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First, let's talk about the different
components that make up the cost for IVF
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You have IVF medications, monitoring, the
IVF egg retrieval, the stuff that's done
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in the laboratory and then the IVF
transfer.
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Let's talk about IVF medications first.
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There are several different types of medications used in
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the process of stimulating the ovaries
before the egg retrieval.
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The most expensive of these medications are called gonadotropins.
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These are the medications that contain
the hormones FSH or LH
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Some of the brands that are commonly used include: Follistim, Gonal-F and Menopur
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Both Follistim and Gonal-F contain FSH and serve as the
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primary hormone to stimulate the ovaries.
Some doctors, however, like to add Menopur
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Menopur contains both FSH and LH. Doctors who like Menopur use it for the added LH
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but this is an expensive choice. The
daily cost for an average 150
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international unit dose of Menopur is
$180 per day. Over the course of an
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average 10 days stimulation this adds
nearly $2,000 to your medication costs.
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A less expensive alternative, which I use
at the Naperville Fertility Center, is
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called the low dose hCG protocol. hCG and LH are very similar hormones. You can use
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hCG in place of LH and it actually works
better because it lasts longer in the body.
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One brand of hCG called Pregnyl costs
about 110 dollars for one bottle
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But that one bottle will last you for the
entire stimulation. So this one change to
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your protocol not only works better, but
can save you about $1,700 in medication costs
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by not having to use Menopur. But
wait - there's more!!!
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hCG is roughly six times more potent
than FSH
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So once the FSH has started your
follicles growing, and you start hCG,
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you can reduce the dose of FSH or in some
cases stop it completely
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How much does this save you?
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If we use an average IVF
dose of FSH of 300 international units per day
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A 600 international unit
cartridge of Follistim would last you
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two days and cost about six hundred and
twenty dollars
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Over a ten day stimulation, that's about $3,100. But if you start low dose hCG by say the sixth day
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and reduce the dose of FSH to 75 you
would save another $1,300 in medication cost
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If you're a patient who doesn't
respond well to fertility medication
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which fertility doctors call a poor
responder, this change can save you
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several thousand dollars. Just think what
you could do with all of that extra money
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How about the IVF laboratory? Do
you know that there are two different
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ways that eggs can be fertilized with
sperm? In the first method, sperm are
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placed in the lab dish near the egg. This
is called standard insemination.
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The second method involves injecting a sperm
directly into an egg. This technique is
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called ICSI, which stands for
intracytoplasmic sperm injection.
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Most IVF centers will charge an extra $1200 to $2000 dollars to do ICSI.
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So should you pay the extra
amount? If you're a couple with a male
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factor, like low sperm counts, poor
motility or an abnormal Cap-Score or a
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history of failed fertilization, then you
should absolutely spend the money to
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have ICSI. But what if you aren't in
one of these groups? First, it's important
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to understand that pregnancy rates with
ICSI are not any better than with
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standard insemination. ICSI is just a tool
to get the eggs fertilized. If you have a
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normal semen analysis and Cap-Score and you use standard insemination, the risk
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that none of the eggs will fertilize is
somewhere around 5 to 15%. In other words,
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there is a 5 to 15% chance you
could end up with zero embryos. If that
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risk is acceptable to you, then you
should discuss standard insemination
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with your doctor. What would really be
great is if you had medical insurance
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that covered the cost of IVF. Here in the
United States, there are several states
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that require insurance coverage for IVF.
The best two states for IVF coverage are
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Illinois, where the Naperville Fertility
Center is located, and Massachusetts.
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Across the world, there are some
countries that pay for IVF as part of
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their national health services, like the
U.K. But there are often restrictions.
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In Ontario, Canada, for example, you can get one cycle of IVF paid for, but you are
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still responsible for the medication
costs. So my tips would be very helpful
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to our close friends to the north. If you
like this video remember to like this
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video. If you have an idea for a future
episode of InfertilityTV, leave it in
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the comments. Subscribe now!
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