Lister Portland- any experience?

[StorkQuest]

Considering to switch clinics to Lister at the Portland. Anyone have any experience with them?

Hello, did you swap in the end? We’ve just started the process with them

Interested also

ive been a patient!!
the nurses aren’t very competent but the doctors are great, it’s clean, everyone friendly.
anything specific you’d like to know?

I’m currently with lister clinic at Portland and have to say we’ve had a good experience. The nurses and doctors have been good. If you want to know anything specific feel free to ask.

Hi @SP83 I had my co-ordination meeting with the nurse today to go through how to do injections. We’ll likely start in late May/early June. How far into the process are you?

Also where did you get your medication from? They told me the on site pharmacy would give me a price but then the pharmacist said no, I had to buy it without knowing the price?!

@desperatelytryingforno2 thank you! Were you there for your first? How long ago?

@Limmers14 I’ve had two rounds with them already, we only had one embryo from these. we just had our first FET but sadly this didn’t take, we’ve got a follow up today but are looking to continue with them, hoping to be able to do a round early May however think it will be beginning of June now. Is this your first round of IVF?

I’ve been getting the medication from the pharmacy there, I didn’t look around as wanted the ease of being able to get it in one place and know that they have what you need in stock. I don’t think prices differ much as it’s all private scripts.

Thanks for sharing. Yes it’s our first round. Have you always been with the Portland or did you try somewhere else before?

I’m sorry to hear it didn’t take. I hope they’re able to give you some answers today and adjust the protocol.

We had a NHS round previously with Croydon fertility clinic, honestly not the best experience took 3 attempts to get to egg collection and we didn’t even get an embryo from it. After that we decided to move clinics as we had to go private at that point and I only wish I’d done it earlier

Hi @SP83 did you decide? I wanted to add that now I’m in the system with Lister at the Portland, they’ve been so responsive and helpful. There was some confusion with the admin team of what tests I needed - the nurse rang me today (Easter Monday) to clarify everything after I emailed yesterday. They’ve been so on top of all the documents too. There can be a lot sent at different times and despite an initially cumbersome registration, it’s a lot smoother now

also added this comment to another thread!

Hey, so glad to hear that things have improved for you! I have to say since we first started with them I can see they have hired a lot more staff so hopefully that’s helping. We’ve carried on with Lister now are on our third round with them and I have my egg collection tomorrow. Staying hopeful that this is the one 🤞🏽

@SP83 oh that’s brilliant, wishing you the best of luck for tomorrow.

Hi everyone, just bumping this thread.
Has anyone else had a bad experience with the embryologists at the lister portland? Ive just started my IVF journey and things were going really well until after my egg collection with the embryologists.

They dont call when they say they are going to call and there isn't a line you can call them. You get put on voicemail. I'm currently going mad waiting for a blastocyst day 6 update. They asked me when I would be free for a call and said they would call around 1045 and now it been 2 hours. Don't they know they are holding peoples hopes and dreams in their hands? I get people are busy but it doesnt take more than a minute to draft an email to say you are not able to call when you said you would.

Hi everyone, just bumping this thread.
Has anyone else had a bad experience with the embryologists at the lister portland? Ive just started my IVF journey and things were going really well until after my egg collection with the embryologists.

They dont call when they say they are going to call and there isn't a line you can call them. You get put on voicemail. I'm currently going mad waiting for a blastocyst day 6 update. They asked me when I would be free for a call and said they would call around 1045 and now it been 2 hours. Don't they know they are holding peoples hopes and dreams in their hands? I get people are busy but it doesnt take more than a minute to draft an email to say you are not able to call when you said you would.

I’m with the Lister Portland too. I have generally found all the doctors and nurses to be excellent but they’re clearly understaffed on the admin/finance side and I agree it’s very difficult to get anyone on the phone. I did have a bad experience with my last egg collection when the embryologist forgot to call me on day 5. I tried calling & emailing various people and leaving messages and it was only late day 6 I think that she finally called me and explained that my only day 3 embryo had failed to form a blastocyst. She was extremely apologetic and totally owned the error (she’d actually incorrectly noted down that she had called me on the right day) but it was quite upsetting that the anxiety was dragged out far longer than it should have been, so I feel your pain. Hang in there and I hope you get a good result when you do speak to them.

Hey @Flippityfish, my experience with their embryology team has been really good. They work crazy hours. I got a call at 8pm one night and the lovely embryologist was so apologetic that it was late and said she was staying at work to call everyone with an update.

I totally understand your frustration and wanting information but it’s literally only the embryologists allowed in the lab, no admin team. It’s under lock and key in there! I’d much rather that they give their time and attention to the lab and are delayed calling me tbh.

Similar to @MintOwl their admin and finance team are definitely understaffed but nurses and doctors are fantastic.

Thanks both For sharing your experiences.
@Limmers14 that's so good they called you at 8pm! I tried to call them at 5 pm, on day 3 and the clinic line was closed so there was no way for me to reach them. I had emailed them earlier in the day letting them know when would be a good time for a call but they didnt acknowledge my email and didnt call at the right time so I missed their call.. when I tried to call back the clinic was shut! Its true, i would rather they spend more time on the culture but probably they should give everyone a heads up at the beginning and say we tend to give you a call on day 1,3,5 but dont worry if we don't call you exactly on that day it means we are still working on your embryos and we will call later. What upset me was that they asked me what time I would be free so we effectively agreed a time to catch up. If they had said, we'll give you a call tomorrow and it might be early or it might be late then I wouldn't have worried so much

@Mintowl that's so crappy of them, especially on day 5... im sorry you had that experience as well. I was trying so hard to keep it together today, but its so difficult when you're already overloaded on hormones, during a stressful period for something you've been wanting and trying for a long time... I agree, I think the doctors and the nurses are great- its such a shame that the embryology team isn't at the same standard.

I do feel that a lot has changed from when we joined them last year. Although the embryology team are great I did have to chase them a few times, I started to call the nurse line and get them to pass the message on

we’ve got a long list of bugbears with the admin/general communication! My current one is with their Hope app if any of you are using that. One of the sonographers told me yesterday that the meaningless notifications it pops up with periodically are just an indicator that someone has looked at your file! I’d kept opening it thinking it might have an important message or document. And I’m still waiting for them to refund something from July..
that said, we are still happy with the more important medical stuff and really rate the counsellor too, once you can get an appointment.

@Flippityfish similar experience with the embryologist team here - they left a voicemail on the Monday saying they had results of our embryo testing… didn’t hear again from them until 6pm on the Friday. In the meantime, I was going stir crazy and trying to get hold of them without success. Made all the worse that the news wasn’t positive - but dragging it out for the best part of a week was tough (and the thought spiral of have they not called because it’s good? Have they not called because it’s bad etc etc). Having said that, they were very kind when I did manage to speak to them.

i guess it’s the nature of clinics but it definitely has felt like a conveyor belt to me with not much personalised attention / interest at times.

@MintOwl and I only recently found out about those hope
app notifications too. Spent ages wondering what I was missing and scrolling through the app…. With parts in German which didn’t help me either 😂

@MintOwl oh my gosh yes, the app is so annoying 😂

But again, I really can’t fault the care. I had a brilliant experience when I was there last week as my period still hasn’t come and the nurses were so kind and knowledgeable as always