Letrozole or DHEA?

I’m awaiting my third and final IVF cycle. I wanted to take supplements for a full three months before my last IVF cycle to say I had given it my all. I’ve done a full 2 months now taking the supplements in the book it starts with the egg. I took DHEA for around 4 weeks, only 25mg daily and it delayed my period for 2 weeks, so I stopped taking it. I’ve just completed a letrozole cycle which did not work. I’ve got enough letrozole tablets for another 3 months. Im undecided whether to try another month of letrozole or to retry the DHEA again. As I’d like to take the DHEA for 6 weeks before my last IVF cycle. Could I take the letrozole and then restart the DHEA a few days later? X

[Hopeful80]

Hello I can’t really comment on letrozole but with DHEA I was told, before I started it I would need to be taking it for a minimum of 8-10 weeks before stimming and that 75mg would be the correct and maximum dose to take to have some effect.

If you are contacting your clinic you may need to up from 25 mg if you decide to take it again. I had read it improves egg quality but unfortunately i ovulated before egg collection so never got to find out did it do any good

Thankfully I had no side effects from it.

Best of luck with your next cycle I’ll b starting my next and possibly my last on my next bleed.

Xx

[Hidden in reply to Hopeful80]

Hi my clinic wasn’t very helpful when I discussed supplements. The consultant said there wasn’t much evidence to suggest supplements helped. Think I will take the letrozole again this month, then once I’m off the letrozole start back on the DHEA, it’s worth a try. X

[Hopeful80 in reply to Hidden]

It is a worth a try for sure -DHEA lots of research it works -we have to try everything to help

[Bebe294]

HiDid you get Letrozol prescribed by doctor and for what exactly?

As far as I know Letrozol is prescribed only for a short 5 days at the begining of cycle normally on day 3 to 7 for regular cycle of people with PCOS or in an ivf protocol.

So I never heard of Letrozol as a supplement!

The function of DHEA is totally different from Letrozol and it works on Testestrone hormon and increase it, so it’s better to know how much is yours before trying bcuz if your Tes. Is already high it will damage rather help

There are success stories with DHEA but if uou dont have any clue on your hormons and if you don’t have PCOS maybe u wanna start with a lower dose like 25 mg per day. I know that everybody talks about 75 mg per day but honostly this high dose is not for everybody.

My comments are based on what I read and experienced myself as well. The best thing is to ask your doctor for ordering hormon tests but if not possible my suggestion wud be like I said above.

Good luck with your journey, all the best!

[Hidden in reply to Bebe294]

Hi I’ve been taking all the supplements recommended in the book it starts with the egg, the only one I haven’t been on for a substantial amount of time is the dhea supplement. I’ve just had a letrozole cycle, which was prescribed for fertility (issue is age and low amh). I know I can’t take letrozole and dhea together as the dhea can reduce to action of letrozole (it would not block estrogen as efficiently).

However I would like to retry the dhea again. When I tried dhea last time it did not increase my testosterone levels, but it did affect my cycle. But I keep thinking it may help with my situation. I’m an advance nurse practitioner, so luckily I can get my bloods done anytime I want. X

[Bebe294 in reply to Hidden]

I am not sure about interaction of Letrozol and DHEA but from what you are saying I think the best case scenario is you take DHEA for couple month and then go for Letrozol or if you are going to do ivf for sure then focus on supplements on making your egg quality brtter like DHEA, PQQ, Ubiquinol, Prenatal, Folic.. etc.

I also took Myo inositol and D-chiro for my last two IVFs. It reduces the AFC slightly but it had great effect on quality of my eggs I believe.

My husband took it too and we had great fertilization rate almost 100%.

Aldo in our first cycle we had 100% rate on blastocyst, 2 out of 2 got into excellent quality blastocyst.

I am in my mid forties and I had 2 other ivfs when I was 42 & 43 but these ones had a much better results. I associate it to the change of protocol ( we switched to mini ivf with Menopur) and antioxidants ( lots of berries fresh fruits) and supplements like I listed above)

Just a note on Myo inositol, there are so many research done on women with PCOS taking this and helping with quality of eggs a great deal. I don’t have PCOS and my husband sperm was normal but still we got a very good results with it.

However for my next ivf I am taking DHEA along with Myo.., apparently they do opposite things so some Dr advise against using together but my friend’s doctor gave it to her together and there was a lady in this forum did the same and had a good results, so I will be doing it but lower dose for both for first month and gradually increase.

You’re very luck you can test your hormons whenever you want xo xo

[Ambar04]

Hey! I took dhea for three months before beginning my ivf cycle. I had low AMH and high FSH. Dhea worked by improving my egg count a lot. Woukd recommend you to take it for at least 8 weeks.