Paul Shin

At the consultation, Dr. Shin took my husband to room to examine him and then he came back and got me where he showed me a clearly formed varicocele that was so apparent it could be seen with the naked eye! He used an ultrasound to show us how large it was. After so much mystery surrounding our infertility, it felt like a huge relief to have an answer! Research showed us that up to 40% of males with a varicocele experience trouble conceiving. After Dr. Shin discovered the varicocele, we recommended a few options including surgery. Because we wanted multiple children and our age, we decided to pursue IVF AND also varicocele surgery with the hope that we might be able to conceive naturally in the future. He performed the surgery in August 2017. Subsequent sperm analysis showed improvement. Dr. Shin stayed in touch with us and consulted with us on the improvements. Following the surgery, we had my husband's sperm analyzed several times and it showed improvement. This was encouraging news. In May 2018, we welcomed out son who had been conceived via IVF. In May 2019, we started TTC naturally and became pregnant NATURALLY 6 months later! We are expecting our son in April 2020. We truly believe that the surgery Dr. Shin performed helped us conceive our son and are so grateful to him. He is a very easy going, compassionate individual with a great sense of humor who guided us during a difficult time and helped us achieve our dream of expanding our family.

If sperm analyses have shown that there are factors below normal range, please see a urologist, specifically Dr. Shin! So many times clinics only look at the woman when male factor infertility can play a role 50% of the time! Because we saw Dr. Shin we were able to tackle the fertility issue and conceive naturally!

Varicocele surgery and follow up sperm analyses.

The varicocele surgery was completely covered by insurance (Aetna).

Paul Shin has the stereotypical rock star surgeon personality. He seems to be mechanically talented as far as actual cutting is concerned, but he isn't a DOCTOR in the sense that a doctor is meant to care for his/her patients. When Dr. Shin' s first and only attempt to help us failed (quite dramatically and surprisingly) he gave up. When we went in for our followup appointment he wasn't interested in even discussing anything but donor sperm. When we explained out RE's plan to move forward without donor sperm, he was utterly dismissive. He mentioned donor sperm three times IN SPITE of us telling him that wasn't the route forward for us at that time. And for the record, we didn't need donor sperm to conceive! Thank goodness he wasn't in charge our case (he is a urologist and our AMAZING RE was in charge) because if he were, our amazing children wouldn't exist! I worry that other REs might not stand up to Dr. Shin's self-important confidence in his believe that if cutting fails then there's no hope at all.

Don't give up when he does.

TESE Microdissection in an effort to retrieve mature sperm in high quantities after a diagnosis of severe oligospermia.

He is open, honest and willing to answer all questions. He explained the preferred course of action and what the results would be. Given our ages, he thought that we should see the varicocele surgery through the 9 month wait period to look for improvements. We chose to move forward with IVF but in the hopes that we could conceive naturally down the line.

Ask all of your questions up front about the chances of success with your treatment.

Varicocelectomy surgery to treat a varicocele causing low sperm count, motility, morphology, etc.