You may have seen the recent coverage regarding Femara – a commonly prescribed medication in the fertility world – it induces ovulation.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6384DN20100409

3 in 10 women take the drug femara to increase their chances of getting pregnant. Femara is a medication that is FDA-approved for breast cancer prevention. Like many drugs, it may cause birth defects when taken in pregnancy. When taken pre-pregnancy, it does not increase one’s risk of birth defects.

It is not illegal for doctors to use medications “off-label.” I’ll give you an example of a medication that we use off-label Read the rest of this entry »

Patients are always asking me, “How much coffee can I drink while trying to conceive?”  There have been studies showing a link between caffeine and miscarriage and studies that show no link. Wouldn’t you think that women in these studies recorded how much caffeine they consumed daily followed by an analysis of their pregnancy outcome? None of these studies were done that way. They were all done by recall. This means women were asked to remember how much coffee they drank when they were pregnant. Researchers then came to some conclusion about what it all means.

Researchers from Johns Hopkins School of Public Health recently published their findings which showed no link Read the rest of this entry »

If you’ve gone through an IVF cycle and didn’t get pregnant, this is what you should know.

First of all, it’s not your fault. The fact that you didn’t get pregnant in an IVF cycle doesn’t mean that you weren’t meant to be a mother. It doesn’t mean that your uterus is a “hostile” environment. It doesn’t mean that you aren’t compatible with your partner. The truth is that much of what goes into whether you get pregnant or not from any given fertility treatment cycle, especially IVF, has to do with probability and chance.  Depending on your age or situation, you may have a fifty percent chance of getting pregnant. This means that fifty percent of patients won’t get pregnant. This doesn’t mean you should stop trying.

Paying for fertility treatments is not easy. There are some states that require employers to pay for up to 6 IVF cycles. You really get IVF for free in some States. Patients are more likely to do several cycles before getting pregnant when they have IVF coverage compared to those who don’t because patients with coverage don’t feel the financial strain on top of the emotional strain when they hear negative results. Now take California Read the rest of this entry »

Trying to have another baby? Have you tried only to have a miscarriage? Let me give you some advice.

I hear this all the time: “I got pregnant without even trying for our first child. Why is it so hard to get pregnant this time?”

It isn’t unusual to have trouble conceiving after having an easy time with your first pregnancy. 1 out of 10 women need to see an infertility doc to conceive and one common reason for this is Read the rest of this entry »