From the point of your initial consultation with IVF Phoenix, you may potentially start an IVF cycle within weeks. Dr Couvaras will determine the appropriate time frame for your fertility treatment but each individual patient or couple decides when it is right for them to begin. The initial consult and diagnostic evaluation usually takes a week up to a couple of months (depending on your menstrual cycle, logistical and financial details such as your travel schedule, availability, insurance requirements, etc.)
After reviewing all diagnostic testing results with Dr Couvaras, the next step is to focus on logistical details such as reviewing the calendar, obtaining IVF medications and learning how to mix and administer them. There are consent forms to be signed, financial details to finalize and possibly some other small details that your primary nurse coordinator will assist you with so you are comfortable before officially starting. This may be done within a couple of weeks or months, again depending on your schedule, insurance, and availability.
Once the IVF cycle starts, it typically takes about 10 – 12 days on average until it is the appropriate time to schedule the egg retrieval. During this time you will be taking injectable fertility medications and will need to return to IVF Phoenix for several visits during that time to evaluate the response to the stimulation medication with blood work and trans-vaginal ultrasound. Once you reach the time of the egg retrieval, this is but another hurdle to cross, and we need to make and find a euploid embryo (s). Once we get to the frozen embryo transfer, you’ve almost reached the finish line and the pregnancy test will occur 11 days after the thawed blastocyst transfer, (day5), to determine the outcome of the IVF treatment cycle. At IVF Phoenix, we have been seeking protocols to improve the outcomes for frozen embryo transfers, and recently, in a small cohort of patients, have been seeing 18 out of 23 FET continuing with ongoing pregnancies. This may be a fluke or the law of small numbers, but the improvement from 50% to 76% is startling and impressive. Unfortunately, we can not be sure what recent changes may be responsible for the dramatic improvement. Thus, we counsel our patients to follow all of the parts of the new protocol until we are able to discern what may be leading to the high outcomes.