Shady Grove Fertility WMA

The clinic overall was not competent at LGBTQ+ care. I was asked about my husband multiple times, and corrected them to my wife each time. Additionally, the billing person/team is horrible and very hard to get a straight answer out of about anything. Not a quick response time, and meaningless answers that requires another round of slow communication to attempt to get a more actionable answer. The phlebotomists are fabulous, as were the nurses on the surgical floor. I don't want to forget them, because they were great. The facility is nice, but I would say that most other things about the clinic are meh or fine. The other techs and the doctors I had in substitution of Dr. O'Brien, I was generally unimpressed with though. Some were even insensitive regarding miscarriage. Literally would only come back for Dr. O'Brien and Christine, because they surpassed all expectations and knew what we needed as a family to feel cared for in this process with so many ups and downs.

Egg donor coordinator and financial coordinator were very helpful, caring and treated us kindly. Dr. Doyle was very nice and caring. Unfortunately, the situation described earlier, ruined our entire experience.

I think Shady Grove Fertility has great facility, doctors and nurses. The only weakness they have is the financial team and billing team. I wasn't happy with them. They made a lot of mistakes in my case.

The clinic environment is welcoming, clean and feels safe. There is a very peaceful and calming energy in the clinic. They are helpful and kind. They always work to fit you in on 'surprise' appointment needs.

Feels a little bit like a number. Different nurses, ultrasound technicians, and doctors every day. Was never given a way to contact doctor directly. However, they were relatively efficient and had their procedures down cold. Embryo lab world class.

Do your own reading!!! Go in prepared to your appointments and know how much you are willing to spend, do not let them tell you how much it all is. Also this clinic is not the only one so shop around!!!

Shady Grove is a huge fertility clinic with multiple locations along the Southeast. Despite being such a large operation with hundreds of doctors, nurses, patients, etc. I never felt like I was in a factory. All of the doctors, nurses and staff act with the utmost professionalism at all times, and are extremely communicative and prompt with everything. Actually, the fact that they are so large and well-known in the fertility world gave me a lot of peace of mind. They recruit the best doctors, and are up-to-date on all of the latest and best research, procedures, treatments, labs, facilities, etc. I never once doubted that my embryos were in the best hands!

SGF is huge and has lots of resources. However there is no coordination to get information to the patient. You have to do it yourself. There is lots on their website - peruse it closely and ask questions. No one will tell you what you need to know, you need to get all the info for yourself. Everyone who works there seems fine but they won't advocate for you if you don't!!! It's on you.

Shady Grove is excellent in caring for their patients. The appointments are quick, but allow plenty of time to ask questions or concerns. My only issue would be the delay the Financial department had in receiving the Treatment referral from our insurance. It took me coordinating between my insurance and the finance department for the referral to come through and it was too late to cover the treatment we were receiving. We had to pay out of pocket for the first IUI.

The clinic is very modern and welcoming. Several of the initial coordinators were great, and provided us with a wealth of information. The waiting areas are very comfortable and provide a bit of privacy for the couples to wait for their appointments.

Shady Grove Fertility has high success rates. It is pretty easy to get an appointment and the doctors/nurses/staff all seem very compassionate. It is a large clinic with many patients per day so my doctor did not perform any of my monitoring or IUI procedures except that he checked in during one monitoring appointment for my 3rd IUI attempt. The other sonographers/technicians/doctors were great so it didn't bother me that he wasn't at all of my appointments.

The clinic for the most part is ok. It’s clean, they have convenient appointment availability, and you are in an out. I would say it feels kind of like an assembly line with ladies lining up back to back. It’s not a warm feeling and the vibe feeling more like a commercial business than a doctors office.

They have a quick process to get patients in and out. Following up with your financial counselor is a MUST because we’ve received incorrect and delayed information as well as other patients we know at SGF.

It is a large clinic. Sometimes it feels like a factory, however the staff knows you and interacts with you pn a human level. No one talks in the waiting room. The medical assistants are very personable. The nurse practitioners in monitoring are great.

You do not see the doctor enough. For as much as these procedures cost, you'd think you'd see your doctor at least once during your monitoring. But you don't. You see other doctors who someones come in to help you understand your monitoring. The billing department is literally impossible to deal with. It doesn't matter if you contract says specifically what they will and won't cover based on your fee, if they have another list (a list you haven't been provided) that says your fee doesn't cover a particular service - even if that service seems completely logical to the IVF process (not something special), you will be charged extra. That said, their shared risk program is pretty amazing if you think you have a chance of not getting pregnant on your first try. Keep in mind, though, that the shared risk program does not cover the injection class (even though it is not stated in the contract that it is not covered, and since it is held at the clinic by clinic staff, should logically be covered by the shared risk program). Also, meeting with your doctor after a failed IVF cycle under the shared risk program to discuss next steps (also seems like a necessary visit that should logically be included in the cost) is also NOT covered in the shared risk program. So basically, you pay your $20,000+ and still have to pay extra to see your doctor throughout your failed attempts. That's super annoying. A strength, though, is that they do have very good medication specialists to figure out your medication coverage through insurance. My first fresh cycle with Shady Grove was with a different health insurance, so it wasn't covered. However, my insurance changed and they have been appealing my insurance denials, and winning! So, if I need to go through another fresh cycle, I will probably have much smaller payments for medication. Fingers crossed. Their care coordinators are great and incredibly responsive.

Although their facilities and clinic atmosphere was very warm and inviting, I would not recommend going to Shady Grove Fertility, especially If you suspect you might have an autoimmune condition or a more complex health profile. SGF approaches patients with a cookie-cutter factory approach, and does not engage with deeper diagnostics and analysis of conditions like thyroid autoimmunity disorders. I had some signs that pointed to a hypothyroid condition (which I painfully discovered was linked with my recurrent pregnancy loss) and unfortunately it went undiagnosed under Dr. Chang and SGF's care for the 18 months I was a patient. It was only after the failure of 2 IVF cycles and my desire to get to the root causes of my health issues that I sought out a functional integrative specialist elsewhere, and then I finally got diagnosed with Hashimoto's. Unfortunately, I cannot recommend SGF, even though I wish I could.

Strengths - The Best in the area! top notch , great facility Weakness - You do eventually start to feel like a number. If you care about being cuddles somewhat it'll irk you. if like me you just want the best results, you'll remind yourself its only for a little bit of time

Shady Grove runs like a well oiled machine. I love that the surgical bays are so clean and organized- trust me, I’ve been to some truely shady fertility clinics (pun intended). The teams for retrievals and transfers are military like in their processes- it makes me feel safe and secure as a patient, that my proceedure is in good hands and that they’re transferring the right embryos. They’re always stopping to match names and procedures.

Great facility. It is clean and new-looking. I have never once gotten the medical heeby-jeebies from any of our treatments. They even have a pharmacy on location. The services they offer are all able to be handled in one place. It is great that both my care and my husband's care is able to be addressed in one location. It works like a well oiled machine without having the mass produced factory vibe.

Very modern, professional, clean. Has their process down. At the beginning of the process, Shady Grove set you up for a coordinator for financial, embryo, office, nurse- all parties which specialized in their reapected areas to help you to navigate when the process starts.

Shady Grove takes great effort to create an environment with compassionate professional care from the front desk folks that greet you at check-in to the medical staff passed in the halls to even how the waiting space is broken up so you don't walk into a massive open waiting room akin to visiting the DMV. When you're having a tough day as many of us do in this process, those things are comforting. We've been with Shady Grove through three IVF cycles and the one area of weakness is the Financial Services team. The Finance team has high turnover, doesn't always lay out costs clearly and at times may take days to respond to your call or message. That said, they are still pleasant to work with. I would suggest doing most communication on finances via email so you have records.

It is a pretty well-oiled machine. There are so many women (and men) that attend the clinic daily for a multitude of reasons and all are taken care of. There were a few times when I knew that during morning monitoring I needed to follow a certain protocol, as delineated by my nurse, however it was not written in the system and they were unable to reach her because it was before 9 am. I had to turn around and go back which was an inconvenience but not the end of the world.

We travelled a long distance to use this clinic due to their wealth of experience with donor eggs as we knew we were at that point. We also were able to qualify for their guarantee program which was well worth it after spending so much money on own egg IVF. It made us feel much more comfortable to know that we could decide how many times to try based on what we wanted and not based on cost. Ultimately we needed 3 transfers and two egg lots to be successful so we were very glad that we used the guarantee program.

This is a very busy clinic. With that being said, most all staff members were compassionate and helpful. SGF has a free therapy group that patients can join and meet others in the same situation. That was very helpful. They also have a wellness center with acupuncture and massage. This was a saving grace for me! I was able to do acupuncture often, and on the day of my transfer.

They are a large clinic, so it can feel impersonal for the check ins, but it is clean, organized, on time and when you meet with your doctor it is personal. They are not totally clear with the billing and its important to stay on top of it yourself so you are not surprised with a large bill. They have great facilities, especially the surgical floor for embryo retrieval and transfers.