Hurdle Ep 10: Donor Egg Clinic Bank Advice Beyond the "Normal" Stuff

Donor Egg IVF Journey Advice:  My Advice For Choosing a Clinic & Egg Bank Beyond The Normal Stuff

[00:00:00] Hey guys, welcome back to Donor Egg Diary. Today I wanted to share some, I don't know, personal advice. You know, the stuff That kind of experience teaches you, or at least taught me. So when my husband and I began this journey well over a decade ago, our regular family doctor referred us to a clinic, a local clinic about two hours away, after we had been trying for about six months.

Actually, I think we were trying for a lot longer 'cause we didn't believe it. But anyways, at the time, I didn't even realize I had a choice outside of that referral or that piece of paper. We actually got incredibly lucky with our clinic because they turned out to be absolutely wonderful. But looking back, I realize probably, I mean, it's not for sure, but I realize probably our doctor likely sent us there because simply they were the closest option to our house.

Um, you know, it did teach me a little bit of a lesson, but way [00:01:00] after the fact because now I know how important it is to choose the right clinic. So, you know, most family doctors only know about fertility clinics probably from just a basic referral logistical standpoint. I'm not sure, but I would assume that they refer to somebody close to you, right?

But just because a clinic's close does not automatically mean they are reputable or that they are the right fit for what you are going to end up doing. And of course, we were completely new at that time, so we had no idea what a fertility clinic journey was gonna be. We didn't know it was gonna be so multifaceted and so many things to do.

But if you were just starting with a fertility clinic, then how do you know that you just go where the referral goes? So what I'm saying is that if you are ever at a clinic, like right now, where you don't feel completely comfortable or even kinda on the same page, [00:02:00] and you get this kinda gut feeling, I would assume, I mean, I've got it with other doctors, just remember you can change clinics.

You're never stuck. So the only thing I would say, if you are going to make a change, do it before you have donor eggs banked at your clinic or before an actual transfer for a donor egg. Because it is so much easier and much safer and way less expensive, I have heard, to transfer clinic before you have any procedure with them.

Because once your eggs or embryos are frozen in a clinic's vaults, moving them is a massive headache. Uh, plus, actually I found out some clinics will actually refuse to take patients who have already gone through a procedure with another, and who have eggs banked elsewhere, uh, because of lab liabilities and differing freeze and thaw protocols.

So anyways, all I'm saying is if you're at an IVF clinic and you really don't like your clinic, you just [00:03:00] don't, then Before you choose donor eggs with that clinic, uh, because it is a specialty, maybe search out a little bit more. And honestly, I was kinda surprised at this lack of specialty knowledge, which donor eggs is a specialty advanced fertility treatment.

I was very surprised, and I shouldn't have been, but I was. It just blew my mind realizing that most general family practitioners, especially ones you-- Because I didn't have a doctor. It's impossible to get a family doctor where I live. So you're literally going online and doing a little phone call with whoever will take you.

But I was even more surprised at the ER doctors. They were like, "What? Donor egg?" Because they seem to have basic training, which totally makes sense. They're not specialists. I mean, I don't know why I'm surprised. Because they aren't reproductive specialists. Hello. I mean, we're not specialists [00:04:00] at many topics, so I don't know.

But it's just getting your head around it because it can be incredibly shocking. When you are in it, you're in an emergency or you're in a cycle, and having to explain your donor egg IVF setup and your medication to a medical professional, and they kinda look at you like, "What?" Is a little scary. So anyways, but that's okay.

Believe me, they get their information. They often go and talk to a specialist on your behalf. So just know that the general medical world doesn't always have the specialized answers you may want, and you have to look beyond kinda the normal stuff when you're looking for a clinic that you probb- probably already know to do, like making sure the clinic has good stats for donor egg success rates and that they work with partner egg banks, because that means that they

And you have to verify this. That means that they [00:05:00] have proper handoff training, which also increases the success rates. But I kinda wanted to get into the real operational things I liked and I didn't like about my clinic after going through it myself, and maybe that can help somebody evaluate a clinic right now.

You know? Maybe it'll help Anyways, because general doctors shouldn't expect to have specialized training, what I absolutely deeply loved about our clinic was the nursing staff. And I mean all the nursing staff, but specifically my dedicated donor team, donor egg team nurses. Holy man. I mean, holy man. It is so important, if you can, to find a clinic that has a specialized donor egg nurse team that works with you.

Usually they have training in this, like there's an actual training because this is, you know, third party reproduction [00:06:00] comes with emotional and physical layers. And when you're dealing with donor eggs, you need empathetic nurses first, not brute nurses that are like process-based. So nurses who don't have specific training in these challenges, you know I'm sure they would find it very hard to deal with us, what I call donorzillas, who are walking into the room truly, deeply already IVF traumatized and hypervigilant on what they're supposed to do with donor eggs and their cycle.

So anyways, because we lived two hours away from our local clinic, going down there for every single tiny visit just wasn't realistic. So we were able to opt for almost all of our consultations and conversations via speakerphone, which I loved. It worked beautifully, and honestly, I preferred it. It was a huge relief to not have to constantly need to be physically [00:07:00] in the clinic to be taken care of, and they reach out a lot.

Because of that distance, I highly recommend choosing a clinic that gives you a direct communication portal to your specific team. So not just to the receptionist, to your team. So I had two, my doctor's team, and then I had two, my donor egg team, my nurses. And I had two nurses that were assigned to me for sure that I know of, because I was always talking to them.

It is incredibly soothing to be able to send a quick heads-up message or ask a frantic question when you're in it or, and, and know that they would always get back to you and you could reread their written answers 20 times over when you needed to. And my husband could read them. And the other nurse, if she wasn't on that day, she could follow the conversation.

It was just, it was absolutely brilliant. So highly recommend, recommend a [00:08:00] clinic that gives you direct communication email portal to your specific nursing team. Excuse me The other thing I really loved is the personal check-in calls from my nurses. At one point in our journey, we had a really bad ER scare, and when the nurse called the next day to check on me after she received the ER report, because I was out, but she called me, and her first response was not clinical.

It was, "I am so sorry. That must have been so scary." And I mean, absolute class act. Like, you know, the training, the empathy, but also she was able to explain after the fact why this sometimes happens and, you know, it just [00:09:00] is what it is. And then she was able to back it up with, "You know, I've had other clients like this and they do great."

So it was just ... It's absolute professional. And you know, if you just get general nurses that don't specialize in donor, because donor, although it's getting increasingly popular, I'm sure it's a specialty. So you know, they have how many people going through versus IVF? I don't know. But I'm sure it's less than own egg IVF at th- at this point, although I think it's going higher.

It's crazy. But anyways, so they would have experience knowing firsthand what their own patients have gone through. And that's what I found the most comforting is they said, "Okay, we have other patients that have gone through this and they have gone on to have full-term babies." So just for hope. You know, they were very careful with their words.

That's the other thing. They never promised anything. They were very direct. They didn't BS you. [00:10:00] They said, "Nope, that's not right." And if we were wrong, they would call us on it. So I mean, they're a special brand. So please make sure, if you can, donor egg nurse team that has training. Or even fertility nurses are amazing.

The ones I had were amazing. So it's just, you know, what you can find I guess. They work endless brutal shifts and I often wondered how they even did it. But having a team always there to kind of help you was absolutely the biggest decision that made our whole process go so well. Now, on the flip side of that, you need to understand kinda doctor dynamics.

We had our doctor, right, for our initial consult and that tracked the ... And that was the main signing doctor for our plans and our decisions and all that. But we did end up seeing a ton of different doctors. And even the [00:11:00] doctors that did our procedures were completely different. So please be aware that you have to make sure that you evaluate all the doctors and their reputations and everything at the clinic, which of course usually it goes with the clinic reputation, right?

Because you never know who you're gonna get. And I remember going into our transfer and I was like, "Uh, where's our doctor?" Actually, that was my hubby. I wasn't even concerned. And I said, "Oh, don't worry, they're all so amazing." And they are because I had already pre-checked up on a lot of them. So really remember that it's not just one doctor.

You gotta be comfortable with probably quite a few within the same clinic if it's a larger clinic. The only thing we really had to go into the local clinic for was the sonohystogram, which didn't take very long. And then after that, uh, medicine pickups. Transfer itself had to be at a satellite clinic that was much farther away.

Anyways, if your clinic [00:12:00] is really far away from you or has to be far away from you because you have no one that'll do it in your country or something like that, look into whether they have a traveling patient protocol. Because I've heard, and I don't know this for sure, but I heard that many reputal clinics will coordinate remote monitoring where you would pay a fee to your local clinic right down the street from your house for blood work and ultrasounds, and they will securely send the data straight to your primary fertility clinic, which could be in a completely different country.

And just be sure to completely trust that close local clinic to do their job properly and turn the data around fast because timing is everything in these cycles, and everyone needs to be perfectly organized. 'Cause I remember I coulda went for free, you know, medical covered stuff, but it wouldn't have gotten done in time.

So then I had to pay for it so that it would go faster. You know, also while we're talking about [00:13:00] communication, let's clear up a huge myth. A lot of people assume that if the nurses would just pre-warn you about every single rare, weird side effect or worst case scenario that could happen, that the experience of actually going through it would be easier.

I learned that this is completely untrue. Even if you know a symptom is statistically normal for some people, it is still 100% terrifying when it is actually happening to you and your baby and your future. So I learnt You don't need a laundry list of hypothetical scares ahead of time, but you do need a team who will answer you with genuine empathy when a real crisis hits.

So once again, it comes back to the nursing team Now, as much as I absolutely love my clinic, there was one major thing I really didn't like about it, and it's just my own personal preference, and it was how the [00:14:00] after-hours emergency on-call doctor system played out in our real experience. I forgot to ask to explain the actual process, I guess, of calling in before a crisis hit.

I mean, I thought, "Okay, on-call doctor, you call them," right? Which, you know. But when you're trying to decide if you are completely overreacting or if you need to literally run to the nearest ER, you don't wanna feel uneasy or confused about whether you should be picking up that phone or not. The other thing, make sure the emergency number from day one is on your fridge, because we actually had to call our clinic to get our answering machine to get the actual emergency on-call number, 'cause we didn't have it.

So when you're in an emergency and bleeding all over the place, not cool. So when my emergency happened, one of them, I was absolutely terrified. Um, I actually had fainted while going to the bathroom, and it's actually very common. But heck if I knew that. So I dialed the on-call [00:15:00] number, but when the doctor answered, it kind of felt like I was I don't know, interrupting a guy eating Sunday dinner with his family.

Like, I was literally shaking, panicking, and bleeding out literally, and I found it so incredibly hard to explain what was actually happening, 'cause I was literally like, I, I was over the fainting, but I was so in shock of what just happened. And it was weird to be talking to a complete stranger who didn't even know who I was.

I will admit I felt a bit miffed when he bluntly said, "Well, that could be completely unrelated to a donor cycle, so just go to the ER." And it was pretty quick that he said that. So I'm thinking, "Okay, probably good advice." So at the time, though, it felt like a little bit of a cold handoff, like, "Why are you bothering me?"

Like, "Duh, go to the ER." Which of course, now that I think back about it, but you, you do, you worry like, "Okay, am I overreacting? What's going on?" Yeah. Anyways, looking back with a clear head now, I know that's [00:16:00] really all they can say to you during a frantic two-minute phone call. Ironically, my other after-hour reach outs for emergencies were much better.

The doctors actually took a moment to look at my file and ask me specific questions. But of course, it also wasn't summertime. So no fault to them. I just wish I prepared myself for what that call would actually be or feel like. So my personal advice is when you have to dial the emergency line, the second they answer, I found it much easier just to state my name, state who my primary doctor was, and explain the exact type of IVF cycle Excuse me, all in that, like one sentence and then deliver the situation.

It helps the doctor go, "Oh, okay." And above all, trust yourself and trust your partner. If you think it's an emergy, emergency, it's an emergency. My partner thought it was way more an emergency than I thought, even though I knew it was, but I [00:17:00] just didn't wanna go. Anyways, don't worry about being a nuisance or interrupting someone's dinner.

Pick up the phone or just go straight to the hospital and let them triage you and make that decision for you once they get there. And you know what? They were emergencies. So now, let's talk about the egg bank. Because our own country didn't have a bank that aligned with what we wanted, we ended up choosing our donor from an international database bank.

We were able to manage the entire selection and filtering all online, right from our couch, and then we had to go into our bank to actually do a wire transfer because nobody can transfer that much money without actually going in, 'cause there's a bunch of safety protocols that they have. Now, know that your clinic's donor nurses or nurses and the egg bank will be communicating behind the scenes once you choose your donor.

Because usually your primary doctor has to officially review and sign off on approve the donor that you [00:18:00] chose if you have entered into some sort of guaranteed embryo blastocyst or live birth program where the egg bank and the clinic act as financial partners. So because of this, you know, um Just know that you m- I, I mean, I don't know if they ever veto 'cause they didn't veto ours, but I mean, there is that process.

That's all I'm saying. Be aware that there is that process. It is super important that your egg bank professionally ships your eggs via high-level medical courier. So look for an egg bank that mandates this, even if you have to pay entirely out of pocket for the courier service, but they have done it many times before.

Do not cut corners on shipping your eggs. Our donor nurses and our international egg bank coordinated the whole thing for our extremely soon transfer cycle, and right through a massive winter storm [00:19:00] and international border crossing. So you do not want an egg bank that has never navigated the complex customs paperwork for your donor eggs to come across borders.

So make sure they have experience with that, 'cause that is super important. The second thing I really disliked about this entire process, and it is tough to deal with, was the guarantee program or the program handcuffs. We wanted to do PGT-A testing on our embryos kind of for peace of mind, but we learned that unlike for IVF, you cannot do it for, for us.

We couldn't do it for our donor eggs because we learned that the fine print dictates you cannot PGT-A test your embryos because if you do test them, all your financial guarantees are voided. And I completely understand why they did it from a business standpoint. The egg bank cannot take [00:20:00] financial risk of the outside labs or potentially damaging them.

But emotionally, it really sucked. You are literally forced to choose between financial protection or genetic certainty. We ultimately chose the guarantee because it's what we wanted. It's what we did. We did choose the right egg bank, so we were just comfortable with the risk more. But it is a massive trade-off you need to mentally prepare for before you sign any contracts, and a decision you're probably gonna have to make The good news in all of this is traveling to a clinic for a donor egg transfer is a million times easier than an own egg IVF cycle.

I was able to take all my prep medications in the comfort of my own home, go to the local satellite clinic to verify my uterine lining was thick and ready to go, and my main clinic, which we had to travel to, pre-booked our transfer date ahead of time assuming that all was a go. [00:21:00] So once we got the green light, we ended up traveling for five days.

We traveled down for the husband's sperm drop, and then you usually have to stay at least until day five or six just to make sure that the eggs are ready, because sometimes eggs take a little bit longer. Anyways, we were able to get away with only taking four days off work with a fifth day as a backup.

If you live much further away and are hopping countries, you likely need to pre-book a full week off and head out. But I mean, no matter how far you are traveling, it's expensive, but purchase the cancellation insurance for your entire thing, like all parts of your trip. It cost us quite a few extra bucks, but knowing we could get 100%, and make sure you read the fine print, 100% of our money back Or that we could transfer it to another time quickly.

'Cause remember, you might not get [00:22:00] your money back before you need it again a week later or a month later. So just read fine print here. But we had a insurance policy where we would get our money back right away if the timeline shifted, and it helped us know that no matter what, we could still do it again.

My biggest piece of travel advice, splurge on the best hotel that is located as close to the fertility clinic that you're getting your transfer in as humanly possible. I mean, like walking distance if you can. Assuming it's a safe area. I would assume it would be. We did it, it was like literally maybe 10 blocks away.

It was like a less than a five-minute drive. It made so much difference for us. We got a fantastic night's sleep. We skipped all the morning traffic and the panic, you know, of getting the sample there within the hour. And we actually had the [00:23:00] embryologist forming our eggs within 20 minutes. Like, wow. It was a huge feeling of satisfaction to have that happen smoothly and sooner rather than later.

And remember, when you drop off your sample, it takes about five to 10 minutes to actually get all the paperwork done, you know, to transfer it for identity and all that. So you wanna give yourself an extra five to 10 minutes for parking. So the closer you can get, the better. Now, was the trip back home glamorous?

Oh, no, no, no, no. I had to administer vaginal progesterone medications three times a day, which I'm sure most IVF people have done, and trying to manage that timing, 'cause it's very strict timing, inside awkward public restrooms is a memory I wish to forget. But you do what you gotta do to get your baby home safe.

Anyways, once we were finally back in our own house, the real work actually began. Feet up, warm tea, [00:24:00] warm food, fuzzy socks, and chilling out with clean organic foods for two weeks until we finally got our beautiful big fat positive. Going home with that tiny embryo inside is a completely different, profound experience that I could never have expected.

And then after that was interesting. But that I'll leave for all the other episodes. Until next time, keep moving forward. I hope this helps.