Shady Grove Fertility Virginia - South VA

Shady Grove has a lot of great resources to leverage during this journey. I especially liked their monthly Monday group meets to meet others who are going through the same process. It was great sharing the ups and downs of the journey with them. It was also great to meet so many parents-to-be at different stages.

The Shared Risk program is the biggest strength of Shady Grove, if they decide you are a candidate for it. Our previous clinic had depleted their donor embryo reserve years ago, so we initially considered the size of Shady Grove's embryo bank to be an advantage. Unfortunately, their embryo bank seems to be shrinking rapidly to the point were are concerned that donor embryos may not be an option for future transfers.

The clinic was clean and new and easily accessed - lots of parking and convenient location. I don’t remember any weaknesses really. I was always seen super fast and hardly had to wait. I was impressed by how well everything worked together,

The clinic is very good at getting your treatment started in a timely fashion, at scheduling you when you need to get in, at fixing scheduling mistakes, and at giving a warm caring impression when you go in for appointments. I will say that sometimes you wait a little bit for your appointments, but that's because the doctors will give you actual attention when you have concerns. When we were doing IUIs they sometimes had meds on hand- not all the time, but sometimes, and it took some of the cost off us. The staff is also PHENOMENAL at billing. My insurance said they'd cover none of the IVF meds, but after the clinic got through with them we found our costs were much lower than expected (we were quoted $3k, ended up just a bit over $1k for a retrieval cycle). I like all but one of the doctors there, and I've seen most of them at some point. The one I don't like is I think one of the male senior partners, I can't remember his name. I saw him a couple of times and had to speak to him as the doctor on call one night. Both in-house visits he explained very basic anatomy terms to me although I was at a point in the process where it was obvious I knew that (I remember him saying "this is what's called the cervix" once and I'm like... dude I'm pushing 40, I know what a cervix is). He also sounded a little distracted and not terribly sympathetic when I called the nurse line with a subchorionic hemorrhage (SCH) early in this current pregnancy. His response was almost verbatim "Well that happens sometimes and we can't do anything about it either way so wait for your appointment". He did offer to get me an ultrasound the next day when he was on call but sounded a little condescending about it. He didn't even mention that an SCH was a possibility, the ladies in a fertility subreddit I'm in brought it up. I spent two days stressing out before my next checkup with Dr. Johnston (who did apologize for her colleague which I appreciate). There is a younger doctor- Dr. Shah I think- who was very respectful of my boundaries and always seemed cheerful without being upsettingly cheerful (if that makes sense). He had a great bedside manner. If you don't have my hangups about male OBGYNs he would be a great choice as well. In general, this is a really good clinic and I'd recommend it to anyone looking for help in the area.

Strengths- friendly staff, timely nursing staff Weaknesses: non-up front transparency with financial services and what it will cost. We spent a little over 1500 on diagnostics, co pays, etc. And we have amazing healthcare coverage.

They have a brand new facility, which is always nice. I wish they offered more adjunctive treatments like acupuncture her in their Richmond office. Appointments usually start within 15 minutes, so wait times are generally short.

Virginia Fertility Associates is a calming environment in a good location. Everyone we have worked with while we’ve been there have been kind. VFA is in the process of merging with Shady Grove Fertility, so the staff has admitted they are learning new systems, etc right now. Just a transitional time for the clinic.

The clinic does not always communicate between team members between the doctor's office and front office staff. The practice has 5 doctor's that are a part of the fertility group, so it is rather busy. They are working on making this more smooth, though, by implementing an electronic system soon. The clinic is on the fourth floor of a medical building, with the sperm lab on the 3rd floor. This makes IUI cycles very easy for us.

Doesn’t seem to be up to date when I went there with current treatments and protocols. A newer partner joined and did one of my IUIs and he’s very forward thinking and open to new protocols and treatments.

There are two clinics. Both clinics provide great service. Waiting area is clean and comfortable. Staff calls you by name. Information for that appointment is given ahead of time so no confusion is had the day of your appointment. No real weakness I have found at this time.

It was easy to get an appointment, clean environment, caring clinical staff and receptionists. I was not crazy about the financial specialist that works under Dr Johnston. I felt like I did not get the information I needed from her and she was very pushy.

Be prepared to come in with a strong and positive attitude up front. It will be very tough going forward but be sure your comfort and care is taken care of. Become acquainted, be open, go over several options and think about it. Don’t make a decision right away. You can make some decisions that cannot be reversed.

The finance department changed their specials after I started my treatment and it was a bit of a hassle to have them honor the original contract but eventually they agreed. The actual clinic was lovely. They moved to a new beautiful building for my second round which was much nicer.

From the first virtual visit, to my "graduation", Dr. Johnston and her team made me feel at ease. Throughout my entire fertility journey, they were supportive, warm, welcoming and overall made me feel as if nothing was my fault and we were going to handle it all together. Dr. Johnston was realistic, but optimistic, every step of the way and it was easy for me to believe it. With fertility treatments, I believe the mental aspect is a huge part. Although a very hard process to navigate, Dr. Johnston and the Shady Grove team made me feel hopeful, which help me keep the mindset that we would find success. It is crazy how much this team turned into a second family. I knew they were just an e-mail away and would have answers for me. Forever grateful and thankful for Shady Grove, Dr. Johnston and the entire team. If you want a medical team who cares, is honest and welcoming- look to Dr. Johnston. Thank you for your expertise in making my dream a reality.

Strengths: they’re a large practice with lots of resources. They’re able to do many different tests/procedures in house. They’re appointment availability is good and they have multiple locations. Weaknesses: because they’re so big at times you do feel like “just a number” unless you really advocate for yourself you get lost in the shuffle a little bit. Their office hours are odd sometimes requiring you to call an after hours or emergency number. Sometimes the answering service then makes you feel silly for calling when your issue “isn’t really an emergency”

It is a little slow and hard to get someone on the phone. However they do a great job managing all aspects of the process. I personally think their business office is amazing as they do all that they can to try and help you figure out the best way to pay for everything.

Shady Grove clinics are efficient and all staff are friendly. I would say their only weakness may be the finance department. I had a hard time with consistent communication from that department but even my nursing staff did a great job in helping me get answers or put me in contact with the correct person.

The facilities are very nice, the portal generally works fine, I really like the nurses and the front desk staff. They have all been doing a good job through COVID. I had some very bad experiences with the financial department but I think there have been some staffing changes that might have helped. They sent me an invoice to my email, it ended up in a non-priority folder, and then I was getting portal messages right before my IUI saying I couldn't have my IUI until I'd paid my invoice. One time I overpaid my balance because the desk staff couldn't figure out how much I owed (???) and then the financial folks refused to refund me, they said it would stay on my account for future treatments. But if they are owed money it's an emergency, even though they know where I live. I don't like loaning my money to large companies for care I haven't received yet. Overall, I find Shady Grove's approach to outsourcing information on clinical treatment to webinars, the volume of consents and acknowledgements I have to sign, the financial clearance to get treatment, the automated invoices, and the use of new portal and patient management systems to be cumbersome and it makes me feel like I'm just a cog in a wheel. It's annoying to have to respond to multiple electronic check ins before an appointment. I have felt like there's all of this homework that gets put on my plate to do and learn, and the focus of it generally is to limit their liability. There are reams of consents and online forms I have to fill out, and the purpose of it is usually to make sure I know there are no guarantees. Overall, the way I feel as a Shady Grove patient is that they are outsourcing as much of the patient information process as they can, their financial and legal systems have had a lot of work put into them to make sure they protect and advantage the company, but there has been very little effort to understand what the patient user experience is and to improve it.

I'm not sure if they grew too quickly, but the service became horrible when Shady Grove took over Virginia Fertility Associates. I no longer saw Dr. Shah at every appointment, and was disappointed when he was unable to do my egg retrieval. The doctors seemed to be overbooked at multiple locations, and not everyone has the same bedside manner. The office double charged us on several occasions, and our insurance didn't cover anything, so that left us stressed out and having to comb through every bill to make sure we weren't being overcharged. It just caused a lot of anxiety during an already stressful event. Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of positive comments for the clinic, I just really liked Dr. Shah.

The clinic environment is pleasant and clean. They have a Keurig in the waiting room, and an encouragement board where you can write notes to others on the same journey. The lab is located on the floor below so it is easy to schedule the semen analysis. The only weakness is the hours of operation. There are no extended hours, and most of the procedure appointments are available before noon only. Scheduling was hard. It was difficult for us to navigate our work schedules to complete these appointments. It would have been so much easier even if they had some availability until 5 PM or 6.

The Virginia Fertility Associates merged with Shady Grove Fertility in Jan 2019. We have notices a huge change for the worst since the change. My phone calls I have been put on hold much more often and much longer. I waited over an hour and a half to be seen for an appointment that I had had scheduled for over a week. Thankfully I did not have to return to work afterwards or I would have had to leave and wait another cycle to return for this specific appointment. It has also taken 3-4 weeks to get a copy of our receipts to submit to FSA which prior to 2019 we could get in a week or two. With Shady Grove taking over, I now feel like a number and not a human in regards to the clinic. If we didn't have the rapport with Dr Steingold we would switch to VCU's fertility clinic.

The office is clean and welcoming and the number of locations are convenient. They decorate for the seasons and love to celebrate every milestone. There are many doctors in the office so you'll have no problem being assigned someone.