Looking to see if anyone can share their experience of doing DuoStim? Where you do 2 stimulation cycles in one back to back. After egg collection you have a few days off stim then restart towards another collection.
I am considering it, my clinic is happy for me to do it (on my request) just unsure at 39 and having completed now 7 cycles. Im not a low responder I do get around 7-9 eggs per collection but we only get maybe 1 max 2 blastocysts. DuoStim can be recommended for unexplained infertility and higher maternal age.
Thanks for any stories ❤️
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Lotofluckneeded
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hi 😊 yes that’s why I said it in my post, I am indeed not low responder. But Duostim can still be recommended for older and unexplained as mentioned. Just wondering why more people don’t do it, other than it’s pretty gruelling to do back to back. Maybe it sounds more effect than it is. Keen to hear people’s stories to understand it more x
Hi Lotofluckneeded. I do hear of more ladies doing back to back cycles creating embryos to bank while they can. Especially in the over 35 yr olds. Hope your next collection is good. Diane
Following as i am also interested in duostim due to low AMH. I have been told it's a good way to bank embryos, especially if you plan to do PGT-A testing, as a number will drop off there. Planning on disucssing it with my consultant in July so I will share back x
really is! Part of me thinks if it was this amazing why do not more people do it, but likewise after many cycles of ivf - I understand it’s mentally draining as well as physically demanding. Having a break can help, but you only have to then restart ! I have a consultation Tuesday so will drop down anything useful that is shared. And wishing you loads of luck with your egg freezing planning
It’s not offered by all clinics from my understanding and it’s not been mentioned to me over my 7 cycles, it was me asking my consultant about it. Not sure it’s routinely recommended but will ask
hello! Wondering if you had the consultation and had any plans with DuoStim? The only other thought I had on it was naturally it’s probably going to be double as costly which is what might put some people off :/ anyway, I hope you’ve got some helpful next steps as it always helps to have some plan of action! X
oh yes thanks for reminder to debrief you .. in short I asked him is it better to do 2 regular cycles or Duostim.. he said in my case 2 cycles .. but he did say that there is the potential to get a better quality egg and to try something different with DuoStim. Which he would support me in. I definitely think if I only got a couple of eggs I would try it. But I tend to get 7ish. From my understanding the cost is almost the same as 2 cycles- it does reduce downtime and think really help low responders. I think I was more like get 2 done, I always feel like I have more to give from scans but my reality is it won’t be as many as 2 standard protocols. I have been doing this for 3 years now, I’m exhausted but not ready to give up. But I only have 2 cycles left in me also why I thought duostim could be good for my mental state. But likewise I need as many eggs as poss. Hope this helps? I have also just started taking dhea so this will also be interesting Xx
hello, thanks so much for sharing the details. It sounds positive that your Dr is open the different options and giving you the best chance for the next cycle(s).
I’m just at the start of my journey and so I expect since I’ve not ever done an egg collection, the Dr will give me a more standard protocol to see how I respond before letting me try different options like DuoStim. Since I’ve got a low (6) AMH I’m wanting to explore all options to maximise egg count so I’ll still bring it up
Interesting that it wasn’t recommended for you - I’m guessing Dr thinks two normal short cycles will get more total eggs? Do you think you’ll do that and maybe mix up something else like the drugs used ?
Thank you so much for sharing your learnings, really appreciate it going into it all! I can see from your profile that you’ve got to blast and pos test stage before which must be so frustrating that your body really can get that far but just hasn’t got that “right” protocol yet. Wishing you lots of luck and I’ll share back if I learn anything helpful at my consultation in early July x
I feel like I have so much knowledge 🥹 and happy to share. We have slightly different circumstances but here if you want to chat. Definitely your first cycle will reveal a lot, but I have everything crossed you don’t need to endure the amount I have.
We had male factor which was only found out after 4 rounds (2 were nhs). Which is infuriating cos I flagged it after round 2 but was told icsi was the only solution - it’s NOT. It I s almost resolved now (was dna frag but last test he is normal, but as a bacteria that also effects sperm which he had before..we had taken antiBs and we’re sent on our way by urologist Jonathan Ramsay who is “the person” to go to.
We luckily have an appointment back with Ramsay but not until 7th July, when I’m due CD1. So working out if should transfer in the meantime.. we have one on ice from round 7 and since that round I’ve had an endomeTRIO - which everything was standard and normal! My current objective is to embryo bank given my age but I can’t if we need to fix sperm 🤪 Standard protocol works well for me and I’ve done between 150-300 drugs, it’s more we get 1 maybe 2 blastocysts and they don’t feel like I should be on a high dose. I’m focusing on egg quality which I am sure you are too. I rattle when I walk and am healthy as much as I can be without not living my life. I also have silent endo which plays on my mind a lot. They say leave it, but in the States they would insist on treating it..
On top of everything I travel abroad sometime for my job (work don’t know about my situ) so that adds planning!
anyways I hope things are simpler for you guys, but you’re doing the right thing getting educated on your options xx
Hello! Thank you so much for your detailed reply (i was on hol so just picked it up now!). You certainly do learn things from forums like these and the experiences you've had. I'm so sorry that Drs haven't picked up on sperm issues earlier for you! So frustrating, and it means learning form other people on forums like these becomes even more important if you don't feel your Dr is always doing what's best for you.
My Dr recently recommended short protocol with 300 meriofert as i have low AMH, and he also advised me duostim may not necessarily get better results, so best to try one short cycle first...I'm quite tempted by the Endo-trio when it gets to transfer stage just to rule out any other issues, but of course all these add ons cost so much when you don't know if you need them or not!
May i ask how you managed to get silent Endo diagosed? I occasionally worry i have but of course don't want to go through a laproscopy unnecessarily!
All the best for your next round. I guess you are now at least so much more educated on the steps you need to overcome...but it shouldn't be this tough and you're so strong to keep going x
No worries at all, hope you had a lovely time!! I am really hopeful for you that round one you get success and you don’t need to go into further investigations and spend a small fortune as we have!
So in terms of endo, my sister has it. She had a couple of laps then fell pregnant naturally after trying 8 years. She has severe pain due to where it is. There is a theory that it is runs in the family. I realised that my bowel movements during my period I had pain. Like cramps. I thought that was just apart of period pain (my period ab pains are v minimal) and also very occasionally during intercourse. I have regular cycles and no other indication of endo. I have private medical so I had to embellish my story on the pain to my GP to get a referral to a gynaecologist - I went with who treated my sister. He felt endo nodules at the top of my cervix and sent me for an MRI. This also showed endo - I have rectovaginal endo. I have been putting off the laparoscopy as all ivf consultants say I’m getting eggs etc. plus given where the mri showed it. However without a lap mri can’t show everything. Now we have almost normal male fertility I can’t help but something is not right even though consultants think I can go ok forever. aI’m nervous about it but I think it’s the best decision and hope it will be completed in the next few weeks!
Anyways hope that helps. Hang on in there! You are so more educated than I was for my first round!! And 300 also seems a good place to start to go get you some juice eggs. You all set up on your supps? Acupuncture is also worth it IF you enjoy it. Sending loads of luck xx
so, i live in USA and I did -mid luteal- protocol, sounds like second part of dual stim? 😅 practically I went for blood tests etc etc on day 4 of cycle, then they waited for my ovulation, then 3 days after I did “baseline ultrasound” and hormones blood work again and they started my protocol. Stims lasted 12 days, I never got period that was natural after my natural ovulation (they said that it could happen and was not going to interfere with ivf cycle, but it never arrived). After 12 days of stims they had me trigger with Lupron only (due to risk of OHSS) and had ER two days after. Got period 4-5 days after ER (one in two I guess 😅), didn’t have problems with OHSS. I had 20 eggs retrieved, 16 were mature, 10 made to blastocyst and 8 tested normal. I’m 37. This was my first ivf cycle and we wanted to do freeze all and test, that’s why doctor went straight to mid luteal protocol (can’t use that one if you want to do fresh transfer because your hormone are all messed up). My second period was 10 days late and then they started me on BCP for 21 days to make it easy to program FET cycle. I don’t know if mid luteal cycle does something better or not but doc said that we don’t have to do down regulation prior to starting it so I liked it. It was all very fast and now when I think about that wasn’t that bad. 12 days is on longer side but last two days my dosage was so small because he wanted to give chance to few follicles to mature enough. When we did baseline ultrasound after my ovulation my AFC was 12. And we did ICSI because hubby had bad morphology. From 16 mature eggs all 16 fertilized and all 16 were still in the game on day 3 (you can freeze and transfer day 3 embryos but we wanted blasts for pga testing) so I do believe ICSI made huge difference for us.
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