IUI v IVF - Info needed!

[Harriet75C]

Hi

TTC for 7 years, got pregnant naturally in June, MMC discovered at 7+5

GP recommended going for IVF, but couldn't get on NHS as am too young.

So we went to a private clinic, who recommended IUI instead of IVF, at least for the first cycle.

I'm hoping it will work, but am not optimistic and the stats for IUI creating a baby are lower than the IVF stats. I know IUI is cheaper than IVF, but if you need more cycles does it actually work out more expensive in the long run?

I'm just trying to pull together a budget to work out how many cycles we can afford, but it's difficult without knowing what drugs we need - does anyone have any idea roughly how much drugs for IUI cost? The clinic has indicative prices for IVF drug packages but not for IUI.

When we did IUI we paid roughly £500 for drugs then, but i'm going back almost 7 years ago. Each cycle we had cost approx £1800.

We had five cycles of IUI

First cycle we got pregnant, but ended in miscarraige at 6 weeks.

Second cycle we got pregnant, but ended in miscarraige at 8 weeks.

Third cycle did not work.

Fourth cycle was abandoned as i overstimulated.

Fifth cycle we got pregnant with triplets - sadly miscarried one baby at ten weeks, then the boys were born early and only one survived. I now have a very happy and healthy and noisy almost six year old.

Good luck with it.

I was advised to try no more than three IUI cycles. I had already had three monitored clomid cycles. I ended up doing one IUI and going to IVF, because I was 37. (nothing worked but I got pregnant naturally later that same year.)

The IUI cost about £350 for drugs and £700 for the procedure. IVF was about £1k for drugs (because of my age, I was on a high dose) and £2,800 for procedure.

There was some research a couple of years ago saying it was better to go straight to IVF. Here's one report of it:

A recent study demonstrates that in bypassing IUI with injectable medications and going straight to IVF, patients will get pregnant at a faster rate, save money, and lessen the chance of having multiple births.

The FASTT (fast-track and standard treatment) Trial, led by Richard Reindollar, M.D., Chair of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center and Dartmouth Medical School, studied 503 couples who met the following criteria. They had no prior fertility treatment, met the definition of infertility (one year of unprotected intercourse) and had no identified causes for their infertility (meaning they had unexplained infertility).

The Trial studied two treatment protocols. In the conventional protocol, patients did three cycles of clomid with IUI, followed by IUI with injectable medications, and then IVF. The accelerated protocol skipped the IUI with injectables, and went straight to IVF following the three Clomid cycles.

The results? Couples in the accelerated arm of the study got pregnant at a faster rate. Of the 503 couples, 64% delivered at least one baby and 10% had a pregnancy beyond five months. Couples in the accelerated arm of the study got pregnant in an average of eight months, while those in the conventional arm got pregnant in an average of eleven months.