I always say...

If IVF were as affordable as, say, IUI, the success rates would be significantly higher. As it is, so few can afford one, let alone multiple IVFs. I am 100% out of pocket cash pay for every cent of the IVFs and drugs. Meaning, for the money I have put into IVF this year, our house would be nearly paid off.

It's a tough choice. My first IVF I ran into a situation where I thought, because of the faulty information from a nurse, that I was only going to have 2 or 3 possible eggs retrieved and my husband and I agonized over what to do. In the end, we so wanted to just see our egg and sperm "get together" in the lab to see if there were fertilization problems that we decided to "go for it." In the end I got 8 eggs that time and 6 embies and it did answer the question that our sperm and eggs CAN do the job on their own. Since then, I've had 2 IVFs with 15 eggs retreived in each. Since I only have a working tube on my right side, my thinking has been if in any IVF cycle where I have 4 or fewer follicles on my left, I will switch to IUI. That almost happened this past IVF (10-12 on my right and only 3-4 on my left on day 6) but suddenly, my left side took off and had nearly as many as the right.

What to do if you can only afford one IVF is a tough call. You can have 6 eggs retrieved and have all do wonderfully, or 20 eggs retrieved and wind up with 2. And there's no way to tell what it's going to be until you've gone through retrieval, etc. Stats tell us that at various stages over 40, you can pretty much count on 70 to 100 percent of eggs to not work. The average number of eggs retrieved in IVFs (I've been told) is 10. Of those, the average fertilization is 70% with 70% of those fertilized fertilizing "properly." Pat once recommended (and I think it's VERY logical) to use IVF-level drugs on a couple of IUIs first (if you can afford it) to see what your response will be so you know what protocal will get you the best result BEFORE committing to an IVF.

Knowing what I know about my responses I would probably no longer go through with an IVF with a chance of less than 10 eggs retreived. However, I could not possibly have known that on IVF #1 and, if nothing else, what I have learned from these IVFs is that we do not have fertilization problems -- which is a huge plus.

Sorry this is so long -- I've been bed bound since my most recent transfer and just got my computer back!

Good luck to you!

Susan