OOP IVF: Shared risk program or not?

olson2903

Another question for you ladies...

For IVF with no insurance coverage. What route did you take: Pay for single OOP IVF or do the "shared risk" type program? Where you get 3 opportunities to "take home a baby" within a year for one flat price, but that price doesn't include monitoring or medicine (~$5k).

I'm trying to determine what would be the best route. Obviously it is different for everyone especially based on their infertility diagnosis (we are MFI). What route did you take and why?

Thanks Again, and sorry for posting to questions in a row. We are new to the whole IVF idea. We are attending a seminar on Thursday, but wouldn't actually pursue this route for at least a year for financial reasons. 

 

Unknown

we chose not to do shared risk program, because...after initial egg retrieval they can freeze embryos at around $100 every three mo (in my clinic). The most  expensive part is egg retrieval meds and procedure. If it doesn't work, you can do another cycle with frozen embryos and way less med cost.

money saving tip, go to ivfmeds.com Ive used them for several of my iui cycles and now my most recent ivf cycle

ekc0630

We also chose not to do Shared Risk.  Our center freezes embryos and we have a year to use them.  1,500 for FET.  Shared Risk if you get pregnant the first time you do not get your money back.  We are also MFI.  I am new to this too but having the ability to pay $1500 for a FET seemed better than the cost of the Shared Risk.  Where are you located?

olson2903

Thank you!

We were also thinking of just paying for the one ivf and not doing the shared risk. I was just confused because so many places offer it, and was curious how many actually take advantage of it. I'm OCD and was making a spread sheet of the different clinics in the area and there cost, and like you both mentioned, we could do a single IVF and transfers for essentially less than the program cost. Also, thanks for the website, I will check them out!!!

I am from Minneapolis. 

twistsandturnsto2

We chose a shared risk program with our clinic even tho our DX was pretty straight forward... Blocked tubes.

OOP cost for a single fresh cycle is about 9000 and a single frozen cycle is about 3500, sorry mobile bumping. The shared risk program that we are using cost 17000 upfront for 2 fresh and at least 2 frozen cycles. The shared risk program also guaranteed a pg up until 26 weeks, so if god forbid you m/c before then, it wouldn't count as a :success: All of these prices included all procedures except for an anesthesia fee and meds were not included of course. At the end of our program we could decide on a refund or a :free: fresh cycle.

We just wanted the security of the program. This whole process, and a lot of our regular lives as well, has been a though road and to have a safety net so to speak really helped ease our minds with the upfront costs. Does it totally suck that we had to take out a loan to cover the cash, absolutely. Hindsight is 20/20 but had we not done it, we would be well over that amount of money with our 2 fresh and about to complete our 2nd frozen cycle. I realize that not everyone can afford to to what we did, but I guess you could say that it has def worked in our favor so far, even without a take home baby yet.

Good Luck with your decision!

shell3879

We did do the shared risk program thru Attain.  It cost $25K and you get 3 fresh, 3 frozen cycles.  So far I am satisfied that we chose this route.  After IVF #1 we did not have any embryos viable to freeze.  So we have to start again with a fresh cycle.  Our shared risk program allows up to 3 years I believe to use all the tries.  Success is defined as a live birth and if you don't take home a baby, you get 70% refund.  Let me know if you have any more quesitons. 

kz's_girlygirl

We chose a shared risk package-  It is for 2 fresh IVF cycles, and as many frozen cycles as you have/can do in a 1 year period to get a  live birth.  If it works on the first yay!  You don't have to keep going.  If it doesn't work, we will still  another fresh chance, and hopefully something frozen.

We weren't confident  enough in the number of eggs/number of quality embryo's to rely on frozen cycles if fresh #1 doesn't work. 

rosemary&thyme

We chose not to do shared risk.

3 fresh and 2 frozen cycles later, I realize hindsight is 20/20. 

tptbabe

There aren't any REs in our area that offer shared risk unfortunately. We called every single one of them just to make sure! We found one 4 hours away, and we're considering travelling there if the IUIs don't work. (Our meds are covered 80% though, so I think it's a better option for us? Especially since we know somebody we could stay with near the clinic.) We don't mind paying a little extra for the "insurance" you know? And we are OOP for all procedures. So yes, I would say that I'm definitely in favour of a shared risk program!

kyoun009

We chose to go out of state to cny fertility. It is not shared risk but 2 ivf cycle plus any fet for $6000. (not including meds or monitoring) My IVF ended in a chemical and we are about to do an FET. So thankful for these freebies, or else I would not be able to afford it. It is such a financial burden! Best of luck to you!

whoberry

We're doing shared risk.  We get 6 tries with our package and it includes monitoring, but not meds. We are totally OOP, unexplained and had two prior losses.  We felt shared risk was the best option b/c we had no idea what might be causing our infertility and were afraid if we did one IVF cycle and discovered what it was no one would let us into a shared risk program later.  Plus with our losses we knew that a bfp didn't guarantee anything so we wanted to be sure we had plenty of tries.

So far we've done one round of IVF and we ended up with 10 frosties.  If we use all of our cycles, I'm guessing it will be 1 fresh and 5 frozen cycles.  If that happens I think it would have been cheaper to pay out of pocket per cycle, but at least we get our money back this way. Plus I had no idea I would respond so well to meds and that we would end up with a good number of frosties.  FETs are so much cheaper than fresh cycles!  Good luck with your decision!