IVF medication prices

[JeNeBaguetteRien]

Every so often people ask whether it's worth shopping around for IVF medication so I thought I'd start a thread where we can share what medication cost and where we bought it as a resource for others looking.

I can only remember from my latest cycle but here goes :

Menopur £10 per 75iu vial
Gonal F £90 per 450 iu pen or £180 per 900iu pen
Cetrotide £15 per injection
Testosterone gel £28

Delivery £65 from Fertility2u (might be cheaper if not refrigerated)

Posted a bit soon, feel free to add below and hopefully help others save a few pounds. I know the treatment costs add up so nice to get something at the most reasonable price, or help you decide if you could be arsed to order for yourself compared to going via your clinic!

Can I bump this?
We originally budgeted about £1500 for our stimulation drugs and Stork have just phoned to arrange delivery and have given us a figure of £2761. This seems really high. Our first stims round was on the NHS, so I have no idea how much I should be paying for the stims part but the above figure seems really high. We're on a short protocol but I think I need high dose stims, so perhaps that has bumped the price up?
We did our FET's with drugs from Asda but I'm not sure if they will do all the drugs needed for stimulation and if they are still cheaper than other places.

Anyone got any wise words?

@CrazylazyJane yes Asda do stims drugs too so worth phoning/popping in for a quote. You also save on the massive delivery/admin fee of the online places too. It can be more cost effective to get smaller prescriptions throughout your cycle as that means if your meds or doses get changed/tweaked then you haven't bought stuff you no longer need. But this doesn't work if buying online as the hefty admin fees eat up the savings.

I have just received costs from Stork via our clinic. Going to pop down to ASDA and see what they can do them for. I'll let you know how I get on. I believe ASDA has a policy to sell IVF drugs at trade price so it should be interesting to see what the difference is!

Blimey that's expensive @crazylazyjane! I'm also going to be doing short protocol and have budgeted around 1500... I'm also getting meds from stork but not heard from them yet. What medication are you on?

Will be interested to hear your comparison @FingersXssd83!

@CrazylazyJane when I did my fresh cycle I went with stork, I had no idea a private prescription and going elsewhere would be so much cheaper. When I was changed to Lublin injections it became clear that my FETs were going to get very expensive. I now only get private prescriptions and got to Asda, they’ll order things in by the next day and I don’t need to worry about making sure I’m available for a delivery driver.

I would 100% recommend you get a private prescription and get things from Asda. They sell at cost price, it won’t be cheaper elsewhere. The price you’ve been quoted is huge, I’d be keen to hear what price Asda give you!

Only thing to consider for Asda is that you need to ask which meds need to be injected and whether you get the needles and syringes in the box, some do, some don’t. If they don’t come with them you can order these from medisave.

Gah! Just been to ASDA and the person who will do the quote isn't in work today. Have to phone them tomorrow.

Thanks for the heads up about the needles @Gardenlady543, I'll ask about that.

I've been quoted £338 for a Gonal F 900iu pen via Stork @JeNeBaguetteRien - so much more expensive than what you paid 😬

What's the deal with getting refrigerated meds from ASDA? Do they store them in a fridge and give you a cool bag to transport them home in or will I need to get one?

@FingersXssd83 None of the meds I’ve got from Asda have been refrigerated. But they will definitely have a process in place for refrigerated medications in the store as so many meds need to be refrigerated. I’m not sure they’ll put them in any special packaging but I could be wrong, is it a long way to your home from Asda, I think it’s unlikely that being out of the fridge for a short period will cause issues, because under most circumstances women are going to have to have these meds with them at work and when travelling etc to inject them during the daytime. You could always buy a cheap insulated lunch box if you want to be extra careful.

You’ll need a sharps bin as well HH the way, I already had one from my fresh cycle, so didn’t enquire but you may be able to order one with Asda if not it’s medisave again.

Wow OP those are super cheap prices! Fertility2u quoted me £16 per menopur vial and that was a few years back. I’m going to email them for a quote and see if it’s worth getting a private prescription from my clinic

Update: I got a copy of my prescription from my clinic. Hot footed it down to Asda and low and behold, they've shaved just under £1000 off the estimate from Stork. There's some question with one of the medicines, whether I need to vials or two boxes of the stuff. The Asda pharmacist couldn't clearly read the clinic doctor's hand writing

I paid £908 for all the drugs and will need to pay for the drug that is unclear on the prescription once I've clarified the dose.

Yasss @CrazylazyJane 👏👏👏 !! That is a huge saving! I got so swept up in the IVF train in my fresh cycle so didn’t think twice about going with stork, women need to know about these savings!

Hey ladies,

Have costs back from three clinics for Cetrotide, Gonasi and Gonal F for our upcoming EC:

Stork: £2101.70
Fertility2U: £2306.75
ASDA: £1974.17

The first two include delivery (£20) which obviously isn't needed with ASDA.

There isn't actually much between the Stork and ASDA cost. The difference here was an extra £120 or Cetrotide and £15 or so for Gonasi. The main bulk of the quote was for Gonal F and they were the same price.

We may end up paying the extra £125 to go with Stork as we know and trust the service and have the meds, sharps bins/needles and syringes etc included.

Hope this helps someone.

Also delivery will save faffing and will stop me worrying about keeping the meds cool when transported. If it was more of a saving, I'd go with ASDA x

Sorry, and another thought! I believe Care charge £50 for a prescription to give to another supplier too so the ASDA saving is less than originally stated.

See, this is what really annoys me. We're having to do our own running around to ensure that we're getting the best prices and we're not being taken for a ride. I know people need to make a living and a bit of profit but it just seems excessive and feels like unnecessary stress at a crappy time.

I emailed my clinic about the unclear quantity on the prescription. Unfortunately, I need two boxes of Rekovelle, which is £700 a box . So £908 for Luveris, Clexane, Fyremadel and Ovitrelle and £1400 for two boxes of Rekovelle. So not the original £1000 off the Stork price but still almost £500 off. We have needles and a sharps bin from our last FET.

@CrazylazyJane I imagine the clinics have a deal with the company they use. My specialist seems quite keen to save me money luckily, but costs can easily spiral on these things. £500 is still a good saving and worth doing, it’s annoying that you’re clinic wasn’t clearer.

Oh that’s interesting @FingersXssd83 I’m surprised the prices were so close, were Asda definitely quoting at cost price? I once got asked to pay more by one worker at Asda as she said I hadn’t paid enough, but I questioned it and when the pharmacist arrived for their shift they corrected her, but I could have easily spent quite a bit extra if they hadn’t. I now check each time I go and say it’s at cost price as it’s fertility meds.

Yes @Gardenlady543 they brought it up with me that they sell at cost price, didn't have to mention it.

Gonal F price was the same as what Stork (via Care) quoted so they are probably well aware of ASDAs policy and adapt their pricing strategy to remain competitive.

Ok, apologies ladies for being a complete noob and asking lots of questions.

The nice pharmacist at Asda wasn't in when I went to collect all my drugs this afternoon. The previous pharmacist had said that she would be able to help me with what needles I needed to order for the subcutaneous Suprecur and Luveris injections. Today's pharmacist said that she had needles in stock (thought Asda didn't do needles but ho-hum) but didn't know what size syringes and needles I would need. Anyone got any idea? I have a random 30gage needle from last time and that looks about right but I'm really not sure if the needles need to be a certain length to reach the right depth of fat.

Also, does anyone have any recommendations for where to buy them online?

No idea with that @CrazylazyJane

To be certain you're getting what you need, I'd contact your clinic.

Hi @CrazylazyJane

I order my needles and syringes from medisave.co.uk

I’ve had a look at my clinics teaching videos they say that Suprecur needs to be drawn up and injected using a 1 ml syringe (search 1ml syringe on medisave and pick one of them).

Some of these syringes will have the needle as part of the syringe. If not this is the one I like to use:

BD MICROLANCE 3 NEEDLES YELLOW 30G X 0.5" X 100SKU: ND304

I also order alcohol swabs to clean the area:

CUTISOFT WIPES - BOX OF 50 X 2 SACHET INJECTION SWABSSKU: 72383-01

My clinic don’t have any videos on Luveris so I don’t know about this one, do you have the item already, if so see if it has the needle and syringe inside. If not tell me the volume you need to inject.

Don’t forget to order a sharp bin if you don’t have one already.

As @FingersXssd83 mentioned, you can check with your clinic to be certain.

Thanks @Gardenlady543

My DP and I did some internet research on subcutaneous injections and DP is much more mathematically minded and worked out what size syringes we will need - it wasn't hard but I keep getting myself in a tizz and panic.

We went on to Medi-Save and ordered 1ml and 3ml syringes, 30gage / 0.5 inch needles, mixing needles, injection wipes and a sharps box. I'm going to take a copy of the Medi-Save order form to my next scan and double check with the nurse. If all goes to plan I start the injections the day after my next scan. Thank you for all your help. Hopefully we're set!

That sounds good @CrazylazyJane hope it wasn’t too stressful for you

So I got my prescription and got a quote from Asda, stork and Fertility2u

Asda and stork had almost exactly the same prices, give or take a few pence (stork was always cheaper eg £18 vs £18.02 per menopur).

Fertility2u were a fair bit more expensive and I remember this from my fresh cycle a couple of years ago too.

Stork charge £57 for delivery so I will go with them just for ease, also Asda couldn’t promise stock of some things.

Prices:
Stork £1199
Asda £1187.92(they sell menopur in packs of 10 though so I have to purchase additional menopur, and also they couldn’t source lutigest, apparently a shortage atm)
Fertility2u £1247.08 without the delivery charge