How was your experience with Alan S. Penzias at Boston IVF?
Dr Pandas was very responsive to questions and requests, even while traveling He is accessible thru the nurse or via email. He was also flexible with us as far as having conference calls when we couldnt meet at his office due to schedule conflicts. We found him as he came highly rated to us from a Chief of another department
Even though I was 40 and had low reserve, was a poor responder he didn't tell us donor eggs were the only choice. He know how we wanted our own child and he said out what our chances were. He has worked with us to optimize how many eggs we get but my eggs are not fertilizing. He is not encouraging or promoting of alternative therapies or naturopathic treatments to improve quality as he thinks they make minimal impact. But he will approve them and supplaments that I chose to do. I always keep him in the loop with what I am taking. He does like the use of acupuncture for transfer.
We are looking to do another cycle or two with him at this point and looking at different treatment options. He has also gone to bat for us more than.once with the insurance company.
What's one piece of advice would you give a prospective patient of Alan S. Penzias at Boston IVF?
He is a down to earth person and a straight communicator that relies on data and proven methods. He is not on the cutting edge but it up to date on everything going on out that and looks to reliable data of success before recommending it to patients. He is very professional.
Go in with lots of questions and you will come out with solid options to choose from.
During treatment, were you treated like a number or a human with Alan S. Penzias at Boston IVF?
He is very fact based but also very personable. He encourages questions and looking at new treatment plans and will discuss it all in detail and give you approx. Success rates of different options.
Describe the protocols Alan S. Penzias used in your cycles at Boston IVF and their degree of success.
For my first cycle we did menopure and gonal f with Cetrotide to suppress, and during the cycle my dosing was upped as I was a poor responder. I ended up ovulating thru the Cetrotide is the cycle was candles.
My next 2 cycles (the first I did immediately after the fist cycle as some research indicates that works better for older women) we switched to micro Lupton and stuck with the m &g. The first cycle we got 1 mature egg that did not fertalize naturally. I took a cycle off then the next cycle we used the same protocol and got I believe 3 eggs. They did not fertilize with ICSI, for the ones it could be used on.
We switched to mini IVF since I was at max doses for stimulating meds but not getting good responses.
Used Clomid with a hcg trigger (same as all the others) and got 6 eggs, 5 mature, none fertalize with ICSI.
Took another few cycles off and did another mini IVF where I believe we got 3 or 4 eggs, nothing fertalized again. It has been attributed to my poor egg quality at my age, even though they look good at retrevial. Dr.P told me at my age less than maybe 1 in 12 eggs are chromosomaly normal, so it is a numbers game.
Describe your experience with your nurse at Boston IVF. (Assigned nurse: Sara Mawn)
Sara is wonderful. Very compassionate and responsive. She was out for a while and we experienced other nursing staff. Most we great! At my first ERA biosposy, I was disappointed in the nursing as the 2 we not very professional, but my second biopsy was the exact opposite.
It is a very large clinic so you will have interactions with many staff, but you also have a main point of contact.
Describe your experience with Boston IVF.
Their strengths are that due to their size you can cycle any time and they do egg retrevial and transfers every day of the year. I also love the Domar Center located at their Waltham location. Acupuncture there is awesome with all practioners and the nutritionist was very helpful too.
You do not usually get your doctor for retrevial, but mine came in once special to do just mine or a weekend morning.
Billing is frustrating as you never get an actual bill or breakdown, and now we are paying out of pocket so you pay ahead for the whole cycle and get reimbursed if you did not use all of the plan treatments.
You do need to be on top of things as far as your treatment as there is not someone to walk you through the process once you are on treatment or remind you. Follow up is also on you. But nurse communication is great and so was the coordinator.
Describe the costs associated with your care under Alan S. Penzias at Boston IVF.
Our first 4 cycles were covered by insurance, but the PGS testing was not. He did appeal to insurance and got 2 cycles covered that were initially rejected by insurance.
Out of pocket IVF was $7750 for the cycle plus 2500 for icsi and 980 for the embryoscoping (which was at our request). PGS was $3300 For 7 to 8 embryos and went up and down from that number
For the mini IVF cycle it is $4950 and that includes ICSI but not PGS testing.
Describe Alan S. Penzias's approach to eSET (elective single embryo transfer) vs. multiple embryo transfer at Boston IVF.
We haven't gotten to that point, but we originally talked about doing only FET transfers of PGS tested embryos and at my age, 1 or 2 at a time.
What specific things went wrong at Boston IVF?
- Failed to call with results
- Failed to convey critical information
Describe the specific things that went wrong at Boston IVF.
My first Clomid challenge cycle i was not called with my results, which required a retest on another cycle, which ended up delaying the start of my treatment 3 months.