Estrogen priming protocol & egg #s/quality

BRaven985

I am curious what anyone's experience has been with EPP.  For IVF #1 I did BCP followed by 150 follistim/150 menopur and I ended up with 31 eggs but the quality wasn't great.  This time she is switching me to EPP w/ 100 Follistim/150 Menopur.  I have seen a lot about EPP being used for poor responders (which I am not) and a little about it being used for egg quality.  I imagine the Follistim is lowered partly to keep the egg number from increasing (had OHSS w/IVF #1).  Anyhoo, I am just curious whose done this and what the difference was in terms of their egg numbers and quality....especially if anyone used it for quality.

violetmarie61516

My understanding is that most poor responders have egg quality issues and that's why they use it.  From what I've seen on the boards, ladies get a higher number and higher quality.  That could be why they are decreasing your Follistim too.  I sounds like a good plan since the first protocol didn't work out so great.  Good luck!

RunCC37

I did estrogen priming and human growth hormone with IVF#2... if you compare the cycles, it actually seems like the second cycle was worse!! 

IVF #1, we did Follistim, Menopur, Cetrotide. 10 retrieved, 6 mature, 6 fertilized (half with ICSI), transferred two 8-cell embryos on day three (both with moderate fragmentation, graded B and C-), the four remaining arrested by day 5. BFN.

IVF #2, we did estrogen priming, Follistim, Menopur, Tev Tropin (human growth hormone), Cetrotide. Slightly higher doses of Follistim and Menopur to try to get a few more eggs. 14 retrieved, 9 mature, 5 fertilized normally, 2 grew to the 2-cell stage then arrested, 3 did not grow beyond one cell. Transfer was canceled.

I hope your's goes lots better than mine!

Lady2010

I am on my first round of IVF (hopefully last!).  Had my ER today - they got 15 eggs.  TBD how many fertilize, etc.

Starting CD21, I was applying Vivelle patch every other day until my cycle started.  On CD2 I started 300 Gonal F and 150 Menopur.  After my labs on CD6 they kept 300 Gonal F but upped Menopur to 300.  Cetrotide was added CD9.  And finally I triggered with Novarel.  

Will let you know how things go from here.  

Good luck with this cycle!

zazu13

You can see my sig. IVF #5 was EPP and HGH. It was my best in terms of numbers and success

Nootbar

@zazu13 did you do an antagonist protocol? MDL? My antagonist was just canceled for poor response. We're 100% OOP and I'm the only one who works (DH is an eternal grad student) so we may not be able to swing many more tries - the canceled cycle alone still cost about 6k. DOR sucks! Congrats on your littles- what wonderful thing.

zazu13

@nootbar

Yes, I did antagonist for IVF 1, 2 and 3. I was at the max stim dose to get the response I did.  

For IVF 4 we tried MDL. 

We are OOP as well. We ended up refinancing our home and getting help from family. to keep trying as well as using our FSA max 3 years in a row. The OOP meds program here at the Bump also was a life saver as we got meds for our 4th and 5th tries. DOR does suck, but you can still be successful! Best of luck to you. I'll keep my fingers crossed for you as I see you just did an IUI.

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Nootbar

@zazu13 - thank you so much for answering my questions! Looking for some hope in all this. Was your 5th IVF also MDL? I think that's what current RE wants to try next. I'm torn between sticking w/ him for that (really do like current RE on a personal level) or going w/ a doc who used to work w/ Dr. Sher and would use his ultra aggressive agonist/antagonist conversion protocol w/ estrogen priming. I didn't like the second RE - he was 45 mins late to our consult, hadn't reviewed our file and then rushed us out bc his next patient arrived. Of course they charged us the full fee. (Also the office environment and set up was just weird- it is a satellite office and felt like he only rents space there and that the unprofessional bimbettes working the front desk didn't even seem to know who or where he was.) But he would use the Sher protocol. Anyway, thanks again for taking the time to answer.

zazu13

@nootbar

No, IVF 5 was the estrogen priming. Best of luck choosing. I did a phone consult with Sher and he suggested the conversion protocol to me as well. I asked my local RE about it, but she wasn't familiar enough with it to try. I did have a decent response on the MDL and 100% fertilization with two good 5 day blasts. I don't know why they didn't take, but I still think it is a good one to try. Best of luck!