Spring Fertility East Bay

I was seen at both Danville and Oakland and I was impressed with every single person I came in contact with. Everyone was always friendly, upbeat, and generally happy to see you/be at work. I always received prompt professional answers, and always felt like the only person they were treating. There is not one single negative to report.

our office experience because a doctor is only as good as his care team. The office ladies are always so sweet, welcoming, and maintain a level of professionalism that I truly appreciate. The ease of use of their portal to communicate with your nurse and reading important documents is also a huge plus for me because I can keep track of all different labs and results. My nurse, Tiffany has been an angel with answering all my questions and 3AM thoughts with such kindness and grace. She's the best!

Spring has the best of both worlds. It’s equipped with latest and greatest of technology and competent providers. Yet it provides care with the delicacy of a small fertility clinic who care about their patients and don’t make you feel like you are just a paying “customer”. I had a wonderful experience dealing with staff and doctors and would recommend it to my friends and family.

Convenient location. Easy parking. Clean space, Offered snacks and drinks and all staff was friendly and polite. The environment was pleasant, equipment seemed clean and new . No weaknesses that I can think of.

I have recommended at least 5 people at my company to Spring Fertility because of how incredible the clinic is. They are organized, efficient, effective (have some of the highest success rates), and the culture and team are incredible.

Spring has a very organized system: billing is straightforward, their patient portal where we get all communications and updates about our treatment is quite helpful and user friendly, the facilities are very clean and modern and since they have different locations you could use for your monitoring, you never have to be commuting too far to get your care. Parking in the Danville office was always good, but in the Oakland office it was a bit difficult so it was good to show up with enough time to be able to find a spot and still make it on time for my appointment.

Very friendly. I almost felt like I wanted to come back to see them later at my last appointment! Having multiple locations also helped as I could choose the closer location for quick visits. I also loved how quickly they moved. I was looking at different clinics and Spring was able to move fastest and get me started sooner than later.

It is clean and comfortable. The staff is warm and comforting. They always have a coordinator follow up after appointments to explain everything again and answer any questions, which is great if you get nervous in the appointments like I do. The front desk staff is friendly and the waiting room is comfortable.

As mentioned before--I think highly of the skillset, kind attention, and dedicated care I received at Spring. I only have two recommendations for how the clinic could better serve patients. First, the whole process would be easier to navigate if Spring provided an overview packet that has sections for every aspect of the journey (e.g., finances, explanation of different protocols, reasonable expectations of success, typical timing). It would also help greatly to have some sample calendars for a certain degree of planning. I heard from multiple people at Spring that they couldn't provide a calendar until we knew my ovulation data for several weeks--but I was just looking for a ballpark so I could understand if I would even be available to do a certain cycle, based on pre-arranged travel out of state. I ended up waiting several months for my egg retrieval because I had to be overly conservative about waiting for a timeframe when I wouldn't travel for a long period. Some earlier predictability--even if not precise at all--would have really helped me. Similarly, it would help if medication costs were predicted so we could map costs at the beginning. Secondly, I hope Spring's new commercial insurance billing specialist continues to be much better than the one that was there 2021-2022. I had a massive billing issue related to my insurance provider, Cigna. The first mistake was that Spring told me I had to pay upfront because they did not charge insurance. However, I later learned from Cigna that they only reimburse directly to clinics. After paying upfront to Spring, I submitted my claim to Cigna. Instead of repaying me, Cigna paid Spring and did not notify me. Spring also did not notice the payment. It took 8 months of my calling Cigna to repeatedly check on my claim before the issue was discovered, then another 6 months before Spring could track down the double payment and refund me. The entire financial issue was an extreme challenge and stress during the end of my pregnancy and first months with a newborn. Despite the challenges listed, the benefits of the knowledgeable, friendly, and dedicated Spring team lead me to recommend them to all friends and family.

Overall the clinic and staff were incredible. They were organized, communicated well, and always saw us on time. We felt informed and supported every step of the way. Dr. Fisher and his team always showed compassion for what my husband and I were going through and resorted hope in our journey to grow our family. We had the most amazing experience and would definitely go back, if needed.

The clinic is great, after a failed retrieval I was upset and blamed the clinic yet then got two opinions from other clinics that said the same thing as my clinic so I was reassured how good my team is.

The clinic was always very clean, welcoming, bright and cheery. All the patient representatives were pleasant and attentive. The payment process was easy and clear. The rooms had very high tech monitors and computers. All the nurses who took my blood were very positive and easygoing and made me feel comfortable. I have no negative experiences with this clinic.

Great clinic, offer latest medical technology , very clean, professional and punctual . Easy to reach and great at communicating . All labs are in house which is very convenient . Trained staff, procedures like Saline ultrasound also done in house

I love this clinic due to its proximity to where I live, as well as its staff. At Spring, you're not meant to feel as though you're just a number - you truly feel valued as a patient & that your needs are being met on an individual basis. You're seen promptly for appointments & the staff is super helpful & nice. It's comforting, given the stressful reason you're there in the first place.

Spring was very clear with costs and made transactions easy. I also never had problems scheduling all the appointments necessary around my schedule. I could chose which clinic to go to, depending where I’d be that day. I could get all my results and information on my portal and they also helped me with my insurance.

Strengths - definitely felt like state of the art equipment especially during the egg retrieval and also seeing the embryologists work in SF made I was visually able to see the state of the art facilities. Extremely clean and comfortable and I could tell all the nurses and drs were extremely professional while also kind and caring. The extra touches such as the sparkling water and snacks/chocolates was definitely a plus. Though for me what is most important is the knowledge and professional of the team which was a 10/10 and the healthcare equipment which was also a 10/10. Weaknesses - the billing team was not as organized or responsive. Sometimes I had to follow up with the billing team on certain questions and one time I was told I had an outstanding payment when I did not. Right now I am resolving an issue with them where a third party billed me for more than what I was told my maximum bill would be.

Spring is a great experience. If only hospitals and primary care care providers are as on top of things as my fertility clinic, life would be so much easier. You don't have to know anything at the start of the IVF process but by the end, you will know a lot and it will have been pretty efficiently communicated by their team.

At first, I was so nervous about this procedure because I hate needles, and I didn't know if I would be treated like a human being. I've wanted to freeze my eggs for a while because I haven't found my life partner yet. So, I wanted to make sure that I had options for my future. Thank you to everyone at Oakland Spring Fertility for giving me such a fantastic experience. Everyone was so kind, efficient, knowledgeable, and hard-working. I loved how diverse the team is and I never felt uncomfortable if a specific nurse was unavailable because I knew all were equipped to take care of me properly.

Clinic was in California, I live in Utah so I started off in Utah and the last two weeks were spend in California in a hotel. I saw the doctor a couple days after I got to California and I didn’t see the next doctor until a week after that, and it wasn’t my main doctor. It was another person because she wasn’t there. So I feel like one of the weaknesses is that I could’ve done one more monitoring in Utah so that I wouldn’t have to spend two weeks in California with one week of nothing. When I did see them, they were very nice and mostly thorough. Retrieval and transfer Or great. I was treated really nicely and it was a great experience.

The clinic was great. The wait was never more than 10 minutes to be seen (usually less) and appointments went very smoothly. Their care-team system is very effective and the staff is very communicative and easy to get a hold of. I wasn't able to get a hold of the on-call doctor they said to contact if need be by calling the main line after hours but I may have chosen the wrong options.

Strength - personable, experienced and knowledgeable doctors, nurses and staff. Weakness - they lost a couple of dr’s in their practice so dr’s had to split their time between offices so appointment days could be limited if you only wanted to see your practitioner in that one office.

I had experience with UCSF (from an egg freezing round) and I found the doc a little insensitive. (After I froze 13 eggs he told me that gave me a 39% chance of a live birth and therefore I should “just go get pregnant now”. Obviously I would have gotten pregnant on my own if the situation were right, otherwise I wouldn’t have been freezing eggs!) I didn’t get any similar weird comments from spring and the clinic was super well organized. I especially loved that since this all happened during the pandemic, the clinic was great about emailing out information about COVID risks in the clinic and during pregnancy. We had to put our treatments on hold for a month because we wanted to start in March 2020 but all medical facilities shut down non essential treatments for a bit. Dr Minjarez called me personally to explain that we needed to pause treatment due to the pandemic which I really appreciated. I also appreciated that there was more continuity with nursing staff at Spring than I experienced at UCSF. It helps to have a familiar face so many of the blood draws. Overall the clinic was clean and professional, all staff we worked with including the other docs were great, and although we were based in the Oakland clinic we had the retrievals and implantation in SF and all the docs and staff there were warm, competent, and proficient as well.

Dr Dovey took a couple days off so I saw a couple other doctors at Spring. They were both great and I felt like I was in great hands, no matter who I saw. Though it’s too early to report success or lack thereof, I would still rate Spring and their staff a 10/10.

Convenient location - few other options in Oakland area. Strengths: clean, well organized Throughout several transfers, I interacted with multiple Spring doctors. The one downside was that for the transfers, I have a challenging case due to my cervix and more than once it wasn't communicated to the Dr doing the procedure about my specific needs, which led to discomfort during transfer. Being used to more transparent medical records, I find their online system not the most clear.

My overall experience was truly wonderful. With the exception of a staff person who is no longer at the company, every person I interacted with was kind, professional, and courteous.  Dr. Fisher is truly a gem- from our first interaction to our transfer, he treated us with respect, consideration, and warmth.  I really appreciated the time he took to answer questions and his excitement at our promising results.   And although I never met Nurse Mel in person, during our phone interactions she exuded care, competence, and patience - she is truly an exceptional provider.     2. The guidance throughout the experience was, for the most part, excellent.  I really appreciated having access to the portal, and the portal is well-organized and information is easy to access.  While sometimes it felt like I was getting the same information explained to me multiple times, I appreciated the reassurance that I was really clear about what to expect.    Things that could be better: 1. The financial documents seemed excessively confusing.  The fact that the same information would appear in multiple places (see attached document) made it hard to know what we were actually responsible for. On the attached cost letter, there are things on it (like the medication) with dollar amounts listed that we didn't actually have to pay for, and other things, like the copay, which were much more than what was listed.  I would strongly recommend making the financial documents clearer and easier to understand.   Relatedly, the costs we paid for semen cryopreservation weren't included on this letter, but should have been.  If you're going to present a cost letter it should include all the charges.  2. The requirement that a known donor submit both a negative covid test and a negative antibody test conducted by Spring is both not medically indicated and an onerous requirement that places a further burden on people who are using donor gametes.  In my (totally unscientific) survey of other clinics, there aren't any that are requiring this.  3.  There were several instances in which my gender-non confirming spouse couldn't choose a box that reflected their reality, and I would encourage you to review your forms with an eye towards inclusivity of queer clients and gender non-conforming clients.(These forms were updated and resent to us).   4. The requirement for psychological counseling is both discriminatory towards people who are using donor gametes and not actually required by any accrediting body as far as i can tell. In the context of the family building process, there are certainly some people who might benefit from counseling, but I would strongly urge you to consider changing the counseling requirement to a recommendation.  Supporting the mental health of your clients who are undergoing fertility treatments is commendable, creating burdensome hoops that people who need donor gametes must jump through is not.