u/Royal_Scholar2951

Hello folks, does anyone know a recommendable doctor in the greater Boston area? Looking to start ivf again in a new town. Any recs will be helpful. 🙏

Hi all-- I might acquire a BCBS plan through my spouse. The plan seems to have a good fertility coverage, but it has a VERY detailed section on who is eligible on what condition for the ivf services. Apparently the patient should be younger than 44 yo & must meet various criteria of hormone levels (FSH, AMH, and Estradiol are mentioned, and CCCT seems required as well). One of the concerning phrases is that they say patient is eligible if they have more than 5% chance of live birth.

Does anyone know how BCBS (or other similar insurance plans with this approach) would determine the chance of live birth in this case? For context, I'm 43 years old, and had retrieved 11 eggs & 5 blastocysts & 1 low-mosaic embryo from my last cycle which was about a year ago. Miscarried at 7 weeks 2 months ago. I'd like to know what my chances are with BCBS.

Does anyone have advice on disputing a bill with a fertility clinic? I’m trying to resolve a billing issue, but the clinic has been completely uncooperative. What options do I have? Is there a patient advocate program or something like that that I can go for?

What happened is: I had SIS performed on me during one of my routine appointments for my transfer. I have a fertility insurance which covers for all monitoring appts of a cycle as a bundle payment, which I already paid for. So I only needed to pay for SIS. The clinic submitted 2 claims for that day; one for SIS the other for some very vague name (something like Evaluation and consultation). The SIS is 100% covered by my medical insurance, but the clinic essentially charged my fertility insurance as well under a very vague name without evidence. I asked for the evidence (or explanation) for this second charge and they keep saying 'as per contract with [my fertility insurance] we billed the code..' which is basically just a non-answer. I followed up with my fertility insurance and they didn't confirm any such contract; they say the clinic billed the wrong code and they should submit the right code, but the billing adviser at the clinic just keeps stonewalling me. So unbelievably frustrating. What are my options here?

I (43F) went to my annual eye exam (in 2 years almost) to an optometrist and she said my optic nerves(?) look larger than normal, for both eyes. She said the ratio is around 0.5 and recommended me to do a further testing. So I scheduled the earliest appointment with her for the glaucoma testing. Now.. should I go find an ophthalmologist for this? Or an optometrist is just fine? How much should I be concerned? When I asked her this she didn't particularly try to reassure me -- only said we can't tell anything until the testing is done.

Hi folks-- like the title says, did anyone have success at 43 or later? (First-time pregnancy only). And if you did, what tipped the scale for you in your opinion (if any)?

Thank you in advance!

I (43F) went in to a w10 scan today and found that both of my twins stopped growing a while ago. There was no heartbeat. Both were measuring about 7w2d, which was about a day after my last scan. I didn't have any symptoms except for the disappearance of pregnancy symptoms.

I have a lot to process right now, but also don't have much time. I have a very busy job and at the same time need to make decisions asap on what to do, as it's been already 3 weeks after the missed miscarriage. I have a few questions.

1. My RE say I can choose medicated abortion vs D&C. What was your experience with them? Which one should I choose??? I'm mostly worried about the uterine scarring and the potential effect on the future pregnancy. I'm leaning towards medicated abortion for that reason but I want to hear what others think.
2. If D&C, should I go to my RE or an OB/GYN (+MFM specialist)? i.e., Who would be generally more experienced for D&C?
3. Should I check if they do it by suction vs scraping? Does this make a difference? (trying to find a way to ask this without offending any professional)

More context in case it's helpful:

1. The reason I'm considering going to an OB/GYN is because she's in my local area while my RE is not. I moved to a neighboring state right after my transfer and I don't have a care team in the new state yet. So far I've been traveling to my RE for all ultrasounds appts. That said, I can travel to the RE to get the D&C if desired.
2. After discovering I was having identical twins, I arranged an appointment with an MFM, which was going to be in mid-June. Now they agreed to see me for D&C, but I'm not sure if this is something they routinely do. I'll have more info on this after the consultation tomorrow.
3. This is my first-time pregnancy and I don't have prior history of miscarriage. My uterine lining was never an issue in my previous cycles either. Generally speaking, my biggest obstacle to pregnancy has been the high-quality embryo formation than the uterus issues. I do want to avoid the situation that my uterus condition gets worsened with this miscarriage.
4. I prefer to do genetic testing after abortion.

Finally... do I have hope? I just turned 43 and this was my only embryo. ER was done last summer where I created 5 blastocysts. It's so painful to be back to square 1. Thank you for reading.

My ivf clinic graduated me at 7w, when they also found out I'm having identical twins. My RE recommended me to follow up with an MFM specialist asap, as this might be a high-risk pregnancy.

So I reached out to one of the most reputable MFM divisions in my local area and they say they'll take me in only at 12 weeks. They say that's their standard procedure to take new patient at week 12 and not sooner. I understand that there's not much MFM can do before 12w. But it doesn't make any sense to me that I will be unmonitored because I'm a high-risk pregnancy (They say I don't need to have an OB separately). If I was not having twins, I'd just go see an OB and they'd typically take me in at 9~10w (right?)

Has anyone been in a similar situation? Should I just reach out to another regular OB? I'm not sure if they'll take me given my medical history (ivf + identical twins). But it makes me very uncomfortable that I won't have any monitoring for my entire first trimester.

I was just told this week (w7) that I am having identical twins, and as if that's not shocking enough, my doctor said he doesn't see any membrane between them and this is likely to be a high-risk pregnancy for me. I was too disoriented to attend to anything he was talking but I believe he was talking about mo-mo twins. I'm now scheduling an appointment with an MFM specialist, while frantically searching for internet for info.

Among so many things on my mind right now, I'm curious if I would be able to work full time during inpatient stay -- assuming I'll go in as early as 24 weeks. (I'm currently a single bread winner). From what I read from internet, it seems like the inpatient stay is necessary for intense monitoring, maybe two times a day? It sounds like I'll be free for most of the day, but of course I have no idea.

Folks who experienced inpatient stay -- what was your experience like? Also, how was your inpatient stay covered by insurance? I'm planning to stay in the in-network provider for sure but I'm still worried given my experience dealing with the healthcare system in the US.