Seeking Advice: Infertility Specialist
Conceiving our now 2-year old daughter was a long process. It took nearly five years, and multiple rounds of failed IUI and IVF. Similar to many women, the doctor I worked with couldn't pinpoint a specific reason for my troubles.
However, by the end my doctor seemed to think my troubles were related to an egg maturation issue: even though my follicles appeared to be the right size on the ultrasound, few would come out mature by the embryologist's standards. In fact, the egg from which we had our daughter was coaxed to maturity for 24 hours before being fertilized through ICSI. As I understand, this is very rare. Nevertheless, we hoped we had pinpointed the problem, and the solution that could be used in the future if/when we wanted to have another child.
We've been trying for the past year to conceive. Unfortunately, the practice that brought us success is on the east coast. We've just had a disastrous ivf experience. Many eggs were retrieved, including five mature eggs, but we had no fertilization. The difficult part is that I don't feel our doctor fully understood our situation. We'd like to try again, but I'm thinking we should consider other doctors.
Has anyone else in this terrific BPN community experienced a similar fertility problem? And/or can you recommend a doctor with the knowledge/experience with this problem?
Thank you for your time and consideration.
--Hoping for success
Parent Replies
I'm sorry to hear about your struggles, I've been through some similar issues. I had some good experiences with Alta Bates (Herndon) and California IVF (Zeringue), though Alta Bates is the closest to this area.
I highly recommend Dr. Phillip Chenette at Pacific Infertility Center in San Francisco. He doesn't mind working with women over 40 and on difficult cases. https://www.pacificfertilitycenter.com/fertility-specialists/philip-e-c…
Dr. Zouves in Foster City specializes in difficult fertility cases - can not speak highly enough of him and his clinic. He goes above and beyond in diagnosing fertility issues and treating as needed during pregnancy.
Such a difficult situation!
This won't help you unless you want to become a Kaiser member, but their fertility clinic is fabulous. Kaiser does a great deal of health research including women's reproductive health. You get the benefit if you're their patient.
While we did not have your specific problem we also gave up on the first IVF clinic we tried and eventually got pregnant with Dr. Aimee Eyvazzedeh. She was *very* creative with our treatment and extremely responsive (unlike any doctor experience we've ever had). If you email her with your questions and concerns she will respond (email [at] draimee.org).
https://www.yelp.com/biz/aimee-eyvazzadeh-md-mph-san-ramon
Dr. Richard Chetkowski at the Alta Bates In Vitro Fertilization Program in Berkeley (http://www.abivf.com/about-us/physicians).
Blessings to you both.
I do not have the same issue as you, but highly recommend the fertility clinic at UCSF. We checked out/started working with 3 others in the east bay and city before going to UCSF, which had been reco'd but was furthest from our home (distance turned out to not be an issue). We, and another family we know, had great luck with them. They were very thorough, where the other 3 wanted to just "give it a shot."
We used Dr. Richard Chetkowski in Berkeley for our IVF treatments. He is very good and knowledgeable. http://www.abivf.com/about-us/physicians
Good luck.
Has your partner checked his sperm quality and count? Men's sperm viability in the U.S. is very low, ave ~ 11% as I recall.
There are oxidative stressors that decrease fertility and one that I see often is unnecessary over-exposure to non-ionizing radiation
from wifi. There are also small levels of constant exposure from hormone disruptors that can also lower fertility like non-ionizing radiation.
Check out Dr Moskowitz of UC Berkeley website on this issue. I give talks mostly on pesticide toxicity but occasionally I am asked to give talks
on the most harmful oxidative stressors. If you want me to invite you next time I give one of these talks (maybe on May 23rd at a health clinic),
I can let you know. I'm waiting for confirmation.