Invia Fertility

Run away! — Claim to have a «patient-​centered focus.» Nothing further from the truth! From lack of communication of expectations, to a just try it once & if it doesn’t work we’ll use donor eggs & sperm donors attitude, to staff & a «high tech» communication portal that does nothing but keep you away from the doctor & staff at most critical moments, to billing department that just told me we still had semen stored & were charging us another $ 600 even though we thought we had transferred ALL of my semen to another clinic a year ago, this place is a complete & total disaster. If couples have had success here, I give credit for putting up with the unprofessional attitude of staff, complete lack of attention to detail, & worst client/​patient relationship management I have ever seen at any business, let alone a fertility clinic where couples are filled with anxiety. My wife, 38 & I, 50, later went to another clinic where, after 1 cycle, we welcomed a beautiful healthy daughter into our lives, but not before having lived through the nightmare of being patients at Invia Fertility. /​Of course, won’t make such strong comments about any facility without the facts to back them up. We went to Invia because I had undergone a vasectomy. We considered reversal, but given her age, we decided to not delay & go forward with sperm aspiration & IVF. Other than her being 38, there were no indications we might have any issues & since I had a vasectomy after having 4 kids in previous marriage. We met Dr. Klipstein who went through the requisite stats & ordered all the tests. Though my file was marked that I had a vasectomy, I was chastised by the staff, at almost every visit, for not having completed my sperm analysis & had to explain each time that this was N/​A because I had no way of giving them a sample. /​My wife began hormone treatments & when she had questions, could not call the doctor or staff directly. Had to access an on-​line portal & ask questions there, or leave message for revolving door of nurses at office because it is virtually impossible to reach anyone live, in any dept. unless you chose the phone option that you wish to schedule an appointment. We rarely spoke to the same nurse twice — horrible patient management process. /​Messages & questions on Invia’s portal may not be returned for 24 hrs. When my wife, a pharmacist, saw her hormone regimen, also on the portal, had been changed, she wanted to confirm with the doctor or nurse the accuracy of the change & understand why. Timing of these treatments is critical, but an answer could not be found until we demanded the doctor call us back, neither the first or last time we did that. /​Expectation setting is critical during fertility treatment. We had a descent number of ovules, but when her eggs were harvested, the nurse came in the recovery area with a huge smile on her face & told her the number of eggs had been retrieved was almost half the number of ovules we had seen growing on ultrasounds. We were devastated because we had no idea that it was normal for there to be fewer actual eggs harvested than the number of ovules seen growing — horrible expectation setting! /​We were lucky to have at least a small number of embryos. We planned DNA testing before implantation, requiring them to stay in their petri dishes until Day 5 instead of being considered for implantation at Day 3. Despite having some healthy one at Day 3 that could have been implanted, none survived until Day 5. It was not until we went to another clinic that we learned not implanting at Day 3 poses more risk to the embryos. We were never informed of the additional risk we were taking with our embryos until we went to new clinic where we chose not to do DNA testing. In fact, on call with the embryologist we were told there was no additional risk to delaying the implantation of the embryos until Day 5. /​When none of our embryos survived & we met w/​Dr. Klipstein to consider next steps, despite having had multiple embryos that had survived until Day 3 with our own eggs & sperm, her immediate & 1^st response was to suggest we use donor eggs & donor sperm. We started researching other fertility centers & found other reviews of Invia where couples thought donor eggs & sperm were prematurely recommended. When we went to the new clinic, no mention was ever made of using donor eggs or sperm. After all, we had already successfully made what appeared to be in the pictures we transferred, healthy embryos. Just hadn’t made it to Day 5. /​In January of 2014 I transferred what I believed to be all of my semen (3 vials that were being kept frozen after aspiration), from Invia Fertility to our new clinic. Recently, I received an invoice for the ³⁄₁₄ to ³⁄₁₅ annual semen storage fee from Invia. «What semen?» After waiting 24 hrs to find out if they still have my semen or if the semen I transferred was mine, I’ve been told to use the Portal to ask any questions I have for the Embryology lab! Stay away!