Egg collection only on certain days?

[leaflake]

I had my nurse planning meeting today. Some queries came up so we didn't discuss actual dates, but when the nurse messaged me afterwards she said they only do egg collections two days a week (mon and thu). Is this normal? I thought egg collection had to be really carefully timed based on how the follicles respond to the stims?

She also said they can only do PGTA testing if my egg collection is on a thursday, which again seems crazy? So if I respond slower than they expect, it essentially rules out PGTA?

Is this normal? This is NHS IVF (except we would pay for the PGTA) at a Care clinic

No that is not normal. My clinic would do an egg collection on any day of the week including weekend.

My clinic only do egg collections and transfers on 3 days of the week. It's a concern for me too but I only found out after we had paid and started the medication

Suggest changing clinics.

Yes this is normal for a lot of clinics unfortunately. My clinic only does transfers on specific days and egg collections on specific days, i still worry about it but so far it has not been an issue and I havnt had to cancel or anything.

It’s a business decision. Clinics that “batch” clients are able to control says when they conduct ERs and transfers. It’s easier for them because it’s predictable but it does mean that they very likely modify your protocols at times solely to ensure your body hits the days they want rather than based 100% on how you’re responding to medications. I think generally it’s okay for folks but after learning about this practice I made it a point to ask every clinic I talked to if they batched clients just to be safe. That being said I think plenty of people still has successful experiences in clinics that do this.

My clinic did this. I think it's OK but as above, they might modify your meds to ensure you hit the right days.

You can go for a different clinic if you're really worried but generally it is fine as they just manage it within your treatment. They will just give you a trigger that ensures you ovulate on the right day, and your meds will ensure you don't ovulate before then. I wouldn't worry.

I just don't see how they are timing it accurately if they only do it twice a week. Regardless of batching your treatment start, since it depends how you respond to the stims? It's potentially 4 days between chances for EC which surely is long enough that eggs can go from immature to over mature? How do they adjust your stims to make sure it hits right?

So frustrated that this has been drip fed to us via a message after my nurse planning appointment, so no opportunity to ask questions except via their app which they're being really bad at responding to.

Not sure if I should look to change clinic over this or not since we are NHS funded - no idea how easy it is to transfer funding?

Hmmm I remember clearly my clinic said, “We’re closed on the weekends, except for egg collections/transfers of course because timing is key…”
They had my egg collections down to a window of a few hours in the morning iirc
They tweaked my egg collection date by one day at the last minute based on what they saw on the ultrasound.

i found them excellent and we got 2 good blastocysts, first one was my son xxx

@leaflake we were with Care Fertility Chester and they only did egg retrievals 3 days a week.

That’s frustrating - seems like a business decision rather than focused on women and their response to medications.

As others have said perhaps they’re so heavily running a medical process they are controlling it so there isn’t an overall drop in their clinic success rates. How do they compare to other clinics in your area.

If NHS funded I can’t imagine you can transfer mid cycle but I wish you well as you go.

I’ve had three full rounds of IVF, and FETs from those rounds. I have had 7 day a week clinics - with egg collections and transfers all timed to how my body was responding. Sundays etc and bank holidays were never an issue.

Only the NHS do this