IVF Plano

From the start, Dr. Douglas spend minimal time with me and my wife. Of the five IUI procedures, he only performed two of them. TWO! He rarely made the decisions when it came to months that we had low follicle counts and the nurses would often tell us, "well, it's up to you" or "it only takes one." We are NOT the professionals and felt we had to make educated guesses. One month, I had ONE mature follicle and we were still told it was up to us, when in hindsight, that is when I wish Dr. Douglas would have been the doctor and had us not go through with the IUI and spend thousands of dollars only to produce one chance. Dr. Douglas is a very robotic and systematic, which as the months went by and unsuccessful treatments increased, was NOT what we needed. We never felt as if we were trying to start a family, it felt as if we were just trying to complete a task.

Go somewhere else. Infertility is such a personal, and often times painfully long, process and Dr. Douglas did NOT make us feel that we were important. There was zero personal relationship between him and us and that was very evident as the months went on.

The first month we tried clomid, but it thinned my uterine lining, so we had to supplement with estrace. Second and third months we did letrozole. I don't exactly remember the fourth month but in the fifth round, we started injectable (Gonal-F). Rationale moving to injectables was to increase follicle count because previous months had been very low (1-3 follicles, at best). All treatments above were unsuccessful.

I believe IUI visits were around $500, out of pocket (insurance did NOT cover IUI). Sonos, after insurance, were around $100. Any appointments on the weekends or holidays, would incur a $30 fee.

In general, he has a dry personality, but do not confuse that with how much he cares for you. He genuinely wants to see his patients succeed. In this field, I have seen so many REI practices and physicians who seem to thrive on attention by intense marketing and focus only on the highs - the positive outcomes. Sadly, in this field, there are just as many lows. I can say without hesitation that Dr. Douglas will be there for you when you are at your lowest (miscarriage) and at your highest (positive pregnancy test) - and he will carry you through the challenges and victories along the winding road that is infertility. I was devastated when my first IUI failed, and I did not ovulate. My second IUI, I was overly concerned and panicked that I wouldn't ovulate again, and I sought out a second opinion with another practice. After that consult, it was clear that Dr. Douglas had my best interest. I completed my protocol and was overjoyed when I found out I had ovulated this time. I was waiting for the nurse to tell me what my next steps were when Dr. Douglas walked by the consult room where I was waiting and lifted his hands, and said, "You ovulated!" He has continued to be as steady and dependable and caring as he was when I first saw him in 2016. My fertility journey has been heartbreaking and challenging. I have immense respect for Dr. Douglas and will always be grateful for his kindness and dependability. He doesn't spend his time on social media platforms seeking attention or showing off pictures of positive sonograms. He is too busy caring for his patients through the highs and lows and being dependable and steady - what infertility patients really need from a REI.

To any prospective patient of Dr. Douglas, I would advise to put your trust and faith in him and follow his lead. He cares for his patients, and he is in the business for the right reasons. He is non-judgmental and makes a very difficult situation seem possible.

I have had 4 medicated IUIs with Dr. Douglas.

My insurance covered some costs, but I mostly paid out-of-pocket. I do not remember the exact amounts, but I have never (not once) had a problem with billing or questioned the cost of anything. This office's billing practices are top notch and as a patient that is so helpful.

Dr. Douglas explained eSET to me in detail and I appreciated his rationale. Due to my age, he provided me my options and respected my wishes on how I wanted to proceed. He made sure I had all the information to make an informed decision.

Dr. Douglas was a perfectly nice guy. I am the type to ask a lot of questions and sometimes I felt annoying asking them. I felt like there would have been a lot left open if I did not have a lot of questions. He was always professional, on time, and to the point which I did appreciate. Very dry personality but nice.

ASK QUESTIONS! You might leave disappointed if you don't. See if there is an email that you can send your questions to. Calling always seemed to be a nightmare and I never fully felt like I was getting my questions answered by the correct people.

I believe we did four cycles of clomid with Dr Douglas and two cycles of Femara. On Various cycles we would use a trigger shot around ovulation time and then progesterone after ovulation. I only have one fallopian tube so we would confirm that I was growing follicles on the "Correct" side and then go from there each month. Each month I had 2-3 follicles all around the perfect size or larger and each time we confirmed that I ovulated. I never conceived from these cycles. We did one round of IUI and we did not conceive this round either. My husband has no issues with his sperm so it was very frustrating to have "perfect" cycles that didn't result in a baby. I felt like we were being pushed with hormones and medication but we weren't really trying to figure out what my actual issue was. When I was going to this office I had already suffered an ectopic pregnancy and two miscarriages and I felt if I pushed to get any testing done it was a hassle. Dr. Douglas did think my tubes were a problem and mentioned multiple times we should probably go to IVF. He was not wrong as I ended up having a second ectopic pregnancy later on and now have no fallopian tubes.

The costs seemed to be pretty standard although I do not remember specifics.

Dr. Douglas was going to let us transfer two eggs when we did IVF. This is what I wanted so I appreciated this.

Dr. Douglas was very honest & really listened to us. This was our second RE doctor and I had a really bad experience with the first one so the fact that he spent almost an hour & half with us on our consultation appointment just talking about all our options and concerns really made me feel at ease. We had knowledge about my BRCA2 breast cancer mutation which I loved! The fact that he knew meds that would keep my risk level down made me feel safe with him as my doctor. He took the time to listen to our long list of questions. He didn’t want to just “steal” our money. Instead of doing all these tests again or unnecessary testing he saved us the money so we could start the IUI process. He is a very understanding & compassionate doctor that really listens to what you have to say.

I would tell them to do some research and make a long list of questions to ask Dr. Douglas cause he will answer them all. Go in prepared.

The first two months we did IUI we did 5mg of Letrozole (2pills every night on day 3-5 of cycle for a week) went back on day 12 to start ultrasounds and did Lupron trigger shot when my follicles were at optimal size 19-20mm. We used Letrozole to keep my estrogen low because of my BRCA2 breast cancer mutation. We would go back after 36hrs of trigger shot and do the IUI procedure. The day after our IUI we would go back to do an ultrasound to see if we released the follicles. The first 2 months we only released 1 follicle. The would start progesterone suppositories that night for the next 2 weeks until we took our pregnancy test. If the test was negative we would stop progesterone. Both months resulted in negative pregnancy tests. The last month we did IUI, Dr. Douglas suggested we take this round with a different approach since our problem was that we had multiple follicles growing but only 1 was releasing, so the last month our game plan was to take 100mg of Clomid & 5mg of Letrozole (2 pills) starting on day 3 of cycle for 7days. Went back on day 12 of cycle to begin ultrasounds. We also did a different trigger shot. We did Ovidrel this month instead of Lupron. Dr. Douglas explained that this would raise my estrogen a little high but worth it if we released 2 follicles so we agreed to try it. We went back 36hrs after trigger shot for IUI procedure. The next day after the procedure we went back to verify if we released. And our change of plans released 2 follicles that month! We were so excited! We start progesterone suppositories the day after the IUI and took them for 2wks until we took a pregnancy test. Unfortunately that month also resulted in a negative pregnancy test. We are currently taking a break before we move on to our next plan.

We were self pay so we had to pay for everything upfront and out of pocket because our insurance didn’t cover anything. Usually all together for meds, ultrasounds, IUI procedure, and blood work it cost around $1500. Sometimes you need more ultrasounds if your follicles are growing slower so that will affect your price. Ultrasounds cost $175 for initial and $125 for more to check on size of follicles. If you have to come in on the weekend it’s $35 fee. Blood work was usually around $160. The actual IUI procedure was about $500-$700 for sperm was and insemination. The meds cost a pretty penny. The Lupron ran around $100. The progesterone cost $160, and the Letrozole cost $14. The Ovidrel shot cost $70.

Doctor Douglas had a difficult time with me during the egg transfer but he did not give up. He tried three separate times until he got it and thankfully it worked. He is the only Doctor that could do it in TX as another Doctor turned me away because he was unable to do the practice transfer. Dr. Douglas is our miracle worker! We wish we had been left with more eggs to transfer but another Doctor has looked at my cycle since then and he even said we were very lucky to have one embryo that stuck. We are forever grateful for Dr. Douglas and his team that they did not give up on us!!

Believe it will happen. Trust the process. Trust God. Trust Dr. Douglas. Trust yourself.

Antagonist protocol with a lupron trigger. I don’t know the rationale but this protocol resulted in an amazing egg retrieval of over 20 eggs!! 17 fertilized with ICSI. Down to 5 on day 3 and then down to 1 by day 5. We transferred the 1 embryo and got a positive pregnancy test. hCG levels were extremely high but failed to double, then leveled off and my daughter was born! PRAISE GOD!

I believe all in it was 20,000. $10,000 for IVF, $5,000 for meds and $5,000 for transfer but I do not recall exactly.

We only had one embryo.

Not warm and fuzzy, zero bed side manner, and not present for many appointments. Quick, efficient, on time. Very little words. "Wizard of Oz behind the curtain." Very little info, seems bored when you meet with him. Not encouraging of questions. Nurses handle everything. Shrugged when I had a miscarriage, offered zero help or explanation. He would be a good choice if you're a patient who doesn't want a lot of info and would just rather trust the doctor to do it all, and not know any details. I prefer someone very thorough and informational. It's probably a personal preference thing.

Dr Douglas be a better fit for a patient who wants to sit back, relax, and let the doctor handle 100%. Good fit for someone who doesn't want to ask many questions or doesn't want to know anything medical. He is very confident and doesn't seem to have any desire to answer questions or talk through things. Not a good fit for someone who wants to see the doctor at most appointments (you rarely see Dr Douglas), or someone who wants to ask questions and inform themselves (which I did).

It was around $18,000 total I believe.

Dr. Douglas sets a time to meet with every plan change. He explains pro/cons of each path available. He doesn't pressure you to do what he thinks. He provides a plan and instructions on your chart, that you have both agreed on during the meeting. When you're ready to begin, you call the office and the staff know what to do. It's very organized and personalized. He is compassionate about his work and patients, but not "touchy, feely".

Meet an appointment to consult with him.

I don't remember

I don't remember

We are planning on IVF. During our consultation to start IVF, we discussed this. Dr. Douglas encouraged, with my age in consideration, to do pre-transfer genetic testing. Then he would transfer 1 embryo. If I absolutely didn't want to do the testing he would transfer 2 embryos. He strongly suggested the testing with 1 transfer.

Dr. Douglas has 40+ years of experience. Within that time, he has learned what works & what doesn’t. He takes the time needed in order to explain the treatment plan, & to answer any questions. I chose Dr. Douglas because I was not getting results at my former doctor. I’m on my first treatment cycle with him, & am very confident in the outcome. I highly recommend IVF Plano for anyone looking for answers.

Lay out your wishes & expectations. Dr. Douglas will be up front & honest about treatment options.

I’m using 2mg estrogen twice daily, estrogen patch every 2 days, 40mg lovenox, baby aspirin once daily, & 1.5cc progesterone in oil injections every night.

Doctor fee for transfer $1480 Lab fee for transfer $1440

Dr. Douglas assesses if you’re a good candidate for twins before deciding if you can transfer multiple embryos.

I only saw him when we completed our consultation. We had all other appointments with his staff. Not much more to say about him since we didn't see him much. I can explain more about my care when I discuss his staff.

Insist all procedures be done with with the doctor.

I was told that my chances using IVF were very low since I have low egg reserve and quality. He suggested doing IUI. We completed 3 cycles. I was given trigger shot injections. During my final attempt, I was also given progesterone suppositories since my progesterone was low. All IUI results were negative.

We paid our insurance rate for specialists and paid out of pocket for the IUIs.

None

Dr. Douglas is not a great communicator but he does answer all the questions you have. He does not volunteer information on his own. I had my only child through Donor IVF under Dr. James Douglas. Second time around I felt very rushed and uninformed during the FET.

Please do your own research before and be prepared to ask questions.

I had to use a donor egg for my IVF process. My donor was my sister and DR. James Douglas did the egg retrieval for her. I had to use donor because of no good eggs left.

My total IVF cost was around $17000 during 2009. The FET was around 44000 during 2014

My doctor at that time did not have a strong opinion on single embryo transfer but he did transfer two eggs the first time. I had one egg left that we froze for future use. I was not much informed about the benefits and trade offs on these approaches.

Dr. Douglas is very matter of fact and to the point. But I appreciated that because I was very emotionally charged being upset that I was even needing to seek infertility treatment in the first place. He clearly explained that treatments that I would be receiving and the time period in which they would take place.

Be confident that Dr. Douglas is a proven expert in this field and his results speak for themselves.

Since we had unexplained infertility we began with the least invasive treatment and proceeded to the more invasive treatments as needed.

we paid around 35k

Dr. Douglas was really wonderful. HE explained every detail of the procedures and answered every single question I had. I never felt rushed, like he needed to get on schedule and go to another patient. He stayed with me until I was comfortable with the information I was receiving.

Write your questions down before your appointments. He really liked that I was prepared and that I had researched the procedures.

We continued to do IUIs because the sperm quality and egg quality were both good. After 5 failed IUIs we decided together that we would need to be more aggressive with IVF.

IUIs cost me approx $500-600 a cycle. IVF cost about $12,000. And that was taking in the fact that the clinic gave me some donated meds.

He is extremely hesitant to transfer more than 2 eggs at a time. He had a patient transfer 3 and all three split. IF you want to transfer more than 2, he has you sign a letter stating that it's your choice and you understand the risks.

My experience with Dr. Douglas was as expected. He shared valuable information, and took into consideration my concerns when deciding on my treatment protocol. I saw Dr. Douglas for two appointments, and he did all my procedures.

Prepare your questions before the appointments.

Medicated IUIs

About $2,000.00 per each medicated IUI cycle. This includes appointments, medicines and procedures.

N/A

Dr. Douglas was warm and understanding. He had a personable demeanor and was very professional. Dr. Douglas took the time to meet with me and understand my egg retrieval situation and the risks involved.

You will be in good hands with Dr. Douglas!

Dr. Douglas employed the highest possible dosage level due to my diminished egg reserve

Medicine and procedure

Not applicable