March 9th, 2010
Affiliate Launches New Website
One of our affiliates, West Coast Fertility Centers is pleased to announce the launch of their updated website on March 1, 2010 www.ivfbaby.com. Many staff members have contributed to this work and the end result is website that will help patients locate useful information in a user friendly format.
New Success Rates have been included along with some beautiful videos showcasing their center and demonstrating some of their services.
We invite you to learn more about the services at WCFC, view their excellent success rates, and meet their highly trained staff. You can also read about the Frozen Egg Bank and our extraordinary success with egg freezing resulting in the birth of 52 healthy babies www.eggfreezing.com. Don’t forget to subscribe to their on-line Newsletter so you can stay informed about what’s going on at their facility. Their blog also contains useful postings about the latest developments at our center.
Thank you for visiting West Coast Fertility Centers.
Tags: Dr. David Diaz, Frozen Egg Bank, West Coast Fertility Centers
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February 23rd, 2010
“Low-Stim IVF”: Another Innovation from West Coast Fertility Center
In-Vitro Fertilization (IVF) is a wonderful medical treatment that offers infertile patients a chance to fulfill their dream of having a child. IVF is a scientific marvel that involves fertilizing human eggs with sperm in our laboratory. It includes multiple injections, blood tests, ultrasound exams and making a financial commitment. At West Coast Fertility Center, we are constantly trying to improve treatments for our patients and recently developed a “Low Stim IVF” protocol to help our patients; less than 35 years of age undergo a more affordable alternative to standard IVF. Prescribing a special combination of medication to our patients means lower cost, fewer injections and less frequent office visits during the ovarian stimulation cycle.
To help minimize multiple births, West Coast Fertility Center policy is to transfer two (2) embryos in our patients under 35 years of age, thereby lessening the need to create multiple embryos. Using “Low-Stim IVF” helps to eliminate the need to store large numbers of frozen surplus embryos which typically occurs during a standard IVF cycle.
WCFC has offered “Low-Stim IVF” since December 2009 and we are happy to report a 50% pregnancy rate with this new protocol. This pregnancy rate is very similar to our standard IVF, thus making it a very viable alternative to selected patients. To find out more about this exciting option please contact Maria, our Patient Care Coordinator at 714-513-1399.
Tags: Dr. David Diaz, Low-Stim IVF, West Coast Fertility Centers
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February 9th, 2010
Hodgkin’s Lymphoma Cancer Patient Freezes Eggs
Being told you have cancer can be one of the scariest diagnoses a patient will ever receive. Young patients that haven’t had the opportunity to start a family, may fear losing their ability to one day have children. Although chemotherapy and radiation can be life saving, they may also cause difficulties becoming pregnant when a patient wishes to start their family. We recently had the opportunity to work with a young woman diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma who would like to share her journey with you today.
Twenty-three year old Brie was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma three weeks before her first visit to West Coast Fertility Center. She wished to learn more about our egg freezing process and was interested in preserving her eggs prior to starting chemotherapy. Dr. Diaz shared our egg freezing thaw/survival rates and 52 healthy live births, two very important factors to investigate when you are considering freezing your eggs.
Since Brie was due to start her chemotherapy later in the month, she decided to proceed with her stimulation protocol immediately. During her frequent visits to our facility, she was truly a delightful patient and our staff developed a great deal of respect for this courageous young patient. She persevered through 14 days of injectable fertility medication with remarkable good humor and close attention to detail. Ultrasounds and blood tests were performed to assess her follicle development. During this period there was ongoing communication to and from her oncologist to coordinate and assure her cancer treatment was not compromised. On the day of her egg harvest, 13 eggs were retrieved and of these eggs 11 were mature enough to freeze. Although Brie has a long road ahead of her, she was able to start chemotherapy knowing her ability to one day have children may have been preserved.
We are pleased to offer our egg freezing services to patients who have unfortunately been diagnosed with cancer. West Coast Fertility Center helps by reducing some of the costs while working closely with Fertile Hope (affiliated with the Lance Armstrong Foundation), a non-profit organization that offers emotional support to cancer patients. Our industry partner, EMD Serono provides free medications to our patients. This helps make egg freezing more affordable to these patients whose medical treatments may pose a risk of infertility. To learn more about egg freezing please contact the West Coast Fertility Center patient care coordinator.
Tags: Chemo-radiation Therapy, Egg Freezing, Egg Freezing Services, fertility preservation, Freeze Human Eggs, Frozen Oocytes, The Freezing of Human Eggs, West Coast Fertility Centers
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December 15th, 2009
In vitro fertilization a moral debate for parents
Many couples who have already had success with in vitro fertilization and who do not want to have another baby face a moral debate: Do they donate their extra embryos to research, to another couple or simply discard them? The moral debate regarding frozen embryos continues, read this article and the response from Dr. Diaz. We are also interested in hearing your thoughts on this subject.
Tags: Egg Freezing, Egg Freezing Services, fertility preservation, West Coast Fertility Centers
Posted in Egg Freezing, Fertility | No Comments »
November 13th, 2009
Study Finds Fertility Procedures Do Not Delay Cancer Treatment
LA Times Health. November 13, 2009 10:11 am.
A study published this week reassures women and their doctors that fertility procedures can be done in an orderly way that should not delay breast cancer treatment. The findings show the key to timely fertility procedures depends on all the parties involved — the patient, cancer surgeon, medical oncologist and reproductive specialists — working together and communicating effectively. Read more.
Tags: Cancer, Chemo, Chemo-radiation Therapy, Egg Freezing, fertility preservation, West Coast Fertility Centers
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