With a situation as important and involved as treating infertility, you want to make sure you’re consulting a team who is going to best help you have a healthy, happy baby. Every fertility clinic will have its own advantages and qualities, so choosing one can be complicated. There are certain aspects to look for that might help you navigate the number of centers available to you.
Here are a few things to consider when you’re selecting an infertility specialist and center to help you start your family.
- Track Record of Success
A clinic’s track record and success rate can typically be measured by word of mouth from past patients or by reviewing the national statistics on in vitro fertilization outcomes. The latter can be found through the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology (SART) website. SART is an organization that collects and organizes fertility clinic success rate reports to make it easy and efficient to compare each center.
Over the years, SART has done an exceptional job at verifying the accuracy of centers’ success rates and standardizing the way they are reported. The website allows you to sort the rates and findings by diagnosis, age, and types of procedure so you can make an objective comparison with unbiased results.
- Cost
The cost of treatments can vary greatly based on the actual procedure, clinic, and geographic region. While an upfront price might seem more reasonable at one clinic than another, it’s important to do a cost-benefit analysis taking success rates into account. Ideally, you want to find a clinic with outstanding success rates, but you shouldn’t have to spend an exorbitant amount of money for those results.
- Transparent Pricing
Seeking a cost-effective option may often lead couples to misleading clinics and deals. If a pricing figure sounds too good to be true, it usually is. Over the years we’ve seen infertility treatment centers advertise money-back guarantees. With these deals, they’ll ask patients to pay for three rounds of in vitro fertilization up front, for example, and if pregnancy isn’t achieved by the third round of treatment, they get their money back.
However, these clinics frequently cherry-pick the “best” candidates to qualify for this pricing, so if they deem a patient has a poor prognosis, the cost of treatments may be exponentially higher. There’s a high chance the patients who do qualify get pregnant after the first round of treatment, which means the additional procedures they’ve already paid for is straight profit for the clinic.
In the end, these types of deals end up costing patients more than if they had gone through the process in a more reasonable manner, starting with simple tests and procedures.
- Personalized Care
Advances in fertility technology make it relatively easy for facilities and clinics to help couples get pregnant. Many clinics have taken advantage of that ease by creating gigantic centers that admit as many patients as possible. The downside to these larger facilities is the loss of personal and personalized care. Couples may not see the same doctor, and the quality of care might not be consistent with every visit. Because infertility treatment can be such an intimate process, couples should consider the size of a facility as one of the determining factors. The majority of patients will feel more comfortable at a smaller clinic, where they can build a relationship with the doctor, nurses, and rest of the staff. And this can be a tremendous advantage if questions, concerns, or stressful circumstances arise.
- A Doctor Who’s on Your Side
Ultimately, couples should look for a fertility center that has a doctor who is truly on their side. When a doctor is looking out for a couple’s best interest, they won’t push unnecessary treatments or tests; instead, they’ll work with a couple to create a plan that will best address the problems. Couples should be presented with a reasonable approach that includes straight-forward pricing. They should be comfortable with the entire treatment plan and feel able to discuss any concerns with their doctor.
The Arizona Center for Reproductive Endocrinology & Infertility has been serving our community and helping couples find the joy of growing their family for more than 20 years. Our experience and detailed care has given us consistently high, reproducible pregnancy rates
Everyone from our physician, to nurses, to billing department, to front-desk staff is on the couple’s side. Our goal has always been to help ease the stress of infertility and help our patients have a healthy, happy baby.
For more information or to schedule an appointment with AZCREI, visit us online or call 520-326-0001.