Coronavirus and fertility clinics.

[mabel92]

Has anyone’s fertility clinic told them they will close due to Coronavirus? I’m due to start treatment and now confused as what to do or whether I’ll be able to start. Thanks.

@Xx40yearsyoungxx
Try drinking lots of water, loading up on protein shakes and loads of loads of full fat milk too x

I’m day 10 stims .,The biggest is about 14 I think , one a bit less and then about 5 around 6mm which aren’t growing . I’m on the max dosage of Gonal F I think ( 375) .... so don’t think I could increase even if they wanted me to ?

Has anyone else been on Gonal F ? What dosage ?

I think it’s prob too late to add Luveris ( i take that could have helped the slow growers to catch up ?)

Thanks all

@Xx40yearsyoungxx
Unfortunately it doesn't sound like the smaller ones will grow much now and even if they did your largest ones could be over mature by that point.
It's a hard decision but I'd concentrate on the two you have and hopefully they'll continue to grow - I don't think I triggered until they were 19mm so you've got a few more days on stims yet? The HFEA wants all treatment completed by April 15th so you've got some time for them to grow without risking abandoning the whole cycle - will your clinic still continue with just 2 follicles? Lots of clinics say minimum of 3 x

Thanks @itwasalovelydreamwhileitlasted .... they haven’t said anything but have a scan tomorrow so something may be said tomorrow ref whether they will proceed with low numbers

Does anyone know the lowest size follicle that they could possibly get an egg from ? .... for example is it possible to get a viable egg from a 10 mm follicle ?

@Xx40yearsyoungxx

Follicle needs to be 14mm plus on DAY OF TRIGGER to have the best chance of producing a mature egg

Because I'm a control freak I kept spreadsheets of all my cycles and on each one the number of follicles 14mm + on day trigger correlated with the number of mature eggs

(Can you tell I spend too much time on google - my IVF doctor just loves it when I turn up for appointments and always asks me about my latest research 🤣)

😂😂😂 @itwasalovelydreamwhileitlasted That’s funny

Did you get eggs from nearly all 14 mm + ones ?

@Xx40yearsyoungxx
Yes all my follicles which were 14mm and bigger all produced a mature egg. Anything smaller than that didn't produce a mature egg x

Anyone with a canx cycle suffering with the downreg medication? I had prostap around 10th march so still have a while for it to leave my system. I wasnt alowed to start my stims....the hot sweaty flushes are Soooo bad🥵 🥵 i didnt suffer like this last time from it ...stimming meds must have kept them Away 🥺

@Xx40yearsyoungxx yes have lots of protein and hopefully you get another few days. Good luck🤞🏽🤞🏽

I hope you are are ok @xx40yearsyoungxx and that you receive good news xxx

Thanks @Matilda128 - they have said to try stims over the weekend to see if that helps

.... as in continue over the weekend

@Xx40yearsyoungxx It sounds like they are really giving you the time to get the best result from this treatment round- that's really good. I hope it goes well this weekend! Take care xxx

I spoke to a doctor at Kings yesterday and he said 6-8 weeks minimum for HFEA to allow them to open (so end May) and then for Kings it would be additional time for the doctors to be released from COVID duties. So I’m switching to a fully private (and will ask for refund from kings) and busying myself trying not to be annoyed at all the things people are allowed to do that aren’t life changing in a positive way but are a much bigger drain on NHS resources (drinking and diy)!

@Dorger
Thanks for the info - I'm also expecting end of May for Create - based on the fact that the furlough scheme ends May 31st but in reality businesses will need to be open no later than then for them to start earning the money they will need to pay their own June wage bills.

The only thing that would change that is if the JRS scheme is extended by the government but can't see that happening as the country will be bankrupt If it goes on longer than that

I spoke to my private clinic this morning and they said that they aren't expecting to get the go ahead from the HFEA to restart treatments until August. I really hope that this is incorrect and it's June!

Hi everyone I am in a similar situation I was due to start nhs ivf this month after years of battling to get this appointment. The reasons for the delay i can understand due to shortage of respirators Drs etc but has anyone had indication as to how long the HEFA will keep the clinics closed and will NHS open after the private ones ? Time is not on my side due to age. I have contacted the hefa and they sent a generic reply saying keep in touch with the clinic hower my nhs dept is now closed and they have enough on there hands witgout me bugging them about when they will re-open. thoughts??

I really pray this is not true :-(

@ivf2020

Unfortunately unlikely to get any clarity for several weeks yet. But yes the suspicion is that NHS won't re start until long after private ones

@CritterTamer

God I hope not! But I can't see that the HFEA can enforce that either as if the lockdown and social easing is eased by end of May when the furlough ends they can't stop private clinics going back to work - they are businesses after all with staff to pay and won't be able to insist they stay closed when there is no furlough to pay the wages

Given the death of the poor woman in the last few days within hours of giving birth as well as pre term labour and infant death I do think it's safer not to be pregnant at the moment x

@itwasalovelydreamwhileitlasted yes thats what im thinking too because of the impact on nhs. Just your thoughts on being pregnant at this time - due to my age and time running out, when do you think it would be safer to be pregnant, i mean if we all have to wait until a vaccine we are talking potentially 2 years, so do I give up now - just after everyones opinions - Iv been fighting for a long time for this Im not sure if I can even move forward if this is the end - hope im making sense

@ivf2020 how old are you?
I think yes, it's not an ideal time to be pregnant.
But even with all these 'baby boom in 9 months, lol' jokes nobody is discouraging people to not ttc naturally.
It feels very unfair that any choice has been taken away from us, although given the choice, I would probably have chosen to freeze after EC anyway as I'm 35 and feel like 6 months or so won't make a massive difference to me.
And you're right, when is the 'right' time to be pregnant? I'm sure people out there would argue that waiting for a vaccine is safest! But that's not going to work for most of us obviously!
What if there is a baby boom and we aren't allowed to go forward because of the strain THOSE people end up putting on the nhs?
If I was a bit older, even only 1 year, and had had the choice to transfer now, I would have done it.

I don't know if that even answers your question 😂
But hope you are okay anyway! X

Hi all - just to give you a bit of an update from me.

I'm an NHS patient and was really worried about my funding being stopped or halted for months on end but I rang the clinic last week and they said that it's all gone through. They also said that they can do all the initial paperwork remotely and also do the first consultation via video call. This means that they will do a lot of the set up without me going in and then when the lockdown is lifted we are ready to go...or this is how I understand it to be.

Still not ideal but at least they are trying.

Do you think private clinics that treat NHS patients will have the same level of delays as NHS hospitals treating NHS/private patients? I'm assuming not but would be interested to hear your thoughts.

@HopingforIVF

If you are having NHS treatment at a private clinic I'd guess there won't be the same delays as the pure NHS ones.

I've had 5 miscarriages and 2 ruptured ectopics and I'm at the point where I'm happy to wait a couple of months so that the risk is reduced - I don't have any tubes left and I'm 37 and this will be our last IVF as there is no more money so I'd be terrified of "wasting" an embryo if I was to catch the virus and it cause me to miscarry again. I don't think we ll have to wait for a vaccine though just until it's no longer an active pandemic

By the way Create is doing a massive discount for new patients at the moment - any IVF treatment reduced to £2k (obviously drugs on top but as they only do modified or mild IVF the drugs aren't too expensive) x

@bunhead34
hi im 35 - 36 in a couple of months, thank you for your thoughts and it kind of does answer my questions in a way- esp the part where ppl are not being told dont get pregnant etc. can i ask are you going through nhs or private? i was on the list for nhs all approved and got the go ahead due to this i will have to beg borrow to go private if they open up those ones first. i don't wont to play my violins but at every stage for the past 4 years i had a spanner in the works to even get to this point. im tired as im sure most of you are. im worried of the decline in egg quality and success after 34 as iv prepared myself for the first one not to work if that makes sense- so we are talking time, money and physical and emotional heartache

@itwasalovelydreamwhileitlasted Im so sorry to hear about your miscarriages , i can understand some of your pain I had one at 5 months, and a ruptured eptopic. Again I dont want to be intrusive if you had the funds would you carry on with the cycles? also about create the discount i have signed up with them, but was never told about any discounts is it on the website?