Explain to me how RE practices work..

I am planning on seeing an RE in January/February. I work in Manhattan so I absolutely need to go to an office in Manhattan. From what I understand..

DH and I go to the first appointment together and see a doctor and go over our history.

Then, DH has to give a sample at some point. This is really the only test DH would have to do right?

Then I have to go at various points during my cycle for "monitoring" where they take blood for different types of tests. These are usually done early in the morning.

Is this correct?

How many times do you see the doctor after the initial consultation? And would my DH have to be present for those appointments if I'm the one with the IF issues?

Re: Explain to me how RE practices work..

You are about right. Even if it turns out DH is the one with the issue you are still pretty much the one who still needs to go to the Dr often (yes , very fair ).

Once monitoring starts you will go on cycle day 3ish, then usually about 5 days later if doing a medicated cycle to see what you have going on with your ovaries and blood work, after that depending on what they see your appointments will become more often leading up to ovulation , they will then either wait for you to ovulate naturally or do a trigger shot to make you ovulate once your follicles are ready,From there you will probably either start with timed intercourse or IUI (if your tests indicated you need IVF right away this is about when retrieval will be, but we will not worry about that now). You will usually then go back 7 days later to check your progesterone and then a week after that for the big pregnancy test, some people skip this and just do it at home especially if they are not taking progesterone (progesterone causes many to not get their periods naturally so they do a blood test before stopping it bc you would not want to stop the prog if somehow you were preg and it did not show up on a home test).
Also, for your first cycle you will need to go for an HSG test to see if your tubes are clear or not, this is sometimes done by your RE but more often a radiologist. This has to be done sometime around cycle day 6-10, I took the day off for this as they only did this is the middle of the day and it is impossible for me to get away and come back in the middle of the day. Some people also may not feel like returning to work, some people feel fine after this test, others may prefer to just go home and veg.

Good Luck!

Re: Explain to me how RE practices work..

Your DH literally never has to go to an appointment ever even if you are dealing with MFI.

I have only done IVF, but here is what I had to do before cycling: preliminary bloodwork, HSG on CD 10, and pap smear.

On CD 2 or 3 of your IVF cycle, you will go to your RE and they will do a sonogram and bloodwork. If everything looks okay, you will then being stimming. On CD 5, CD 7, CD 9-11, I went back for bloodwork and sono. On CD 12, I had my ER. On CD 17, I had my ET.

I went to RMA in NYC and would recommend them.

Explain to me how RE practices work..

Sounds about right. DH and I sat down with RE and discussed everything and I had a sono at the first appointment. I had a HSG test a few weeks later to see if my tubes were blocked. I then had a saline sono bc they thought they saw something at the HSG. I also had an MRI for high Prolactin. DH and I got BW drawn to check for diseases etc. DH did his sample. After all tests were back we started the next cycle with IUI.

Dh comes with me for monitoring if it falls on a Saturday. On the weekdays I go by myself bc I need to get a 6am appointment so I can make it to work on time. Every time I go in I get BW and a sono. For IUIs I went in maybe 5 times during a cycle. For IVF maybe 8-10 times. IVF involves way more time bc you also have to do an egg retrieval and an egg transfer. So for IVF I usually have to take off 2 days and for IUI one day for the IUI.

Good luck.