[lizzie518]

We have had one failed IVF and one FET in which the blasts did not survive the thaw. We are switching REs and will be with one that only provides shared risk through integramed. I will be calling integramed tomorrow morning to see if I qualify, but have some questions for those of you who are in their program or have tried to qualify:

1. Will they take someone who has had a failed cycle if the rest of their numbers are good (good FSH, E2 sperm, etc.)?

2. How does the refund program really work? It says that you can opt out even if you have not completed all 3 cycles and still get you refund. Do you get the full 70% refund when you opt out early? So - say I get through with cycle #1 and decide I want to switch to an RE who is not part of their program. Do I get back 70% of what I paid? Or say I am emotionally done after 2 cycles? I still get back the 70%?

3. The site says that you can add ICSI into your plan for extra. How much extra are we talking about?

4. Does the plan cover assisted hatching?

5. It covers FETs only if you have leftover embryos. Does it cover freezing? All aspects of FET?

5. Are all labs, ultrasounds, ER, and ET covered? How about anesthesia? Is this covered too? What about the baseline ultrasound and the beta? The follow up appointment after beta? Embryo glue? Anything else I'm missing?

Has anyone had any positive or negative dealings with the plan? You can PM me if you prefer not to make negative comments on here.

Thanks ladies!

[historyteach]

i wish i had some more information for you but make sure you check out the october thread for the shared risk program because someone put a link up there for a coupon for $500 off. i hope that helps, i know i can tell you about my shared risk program, but i don't think that is going to help you. best of luck lizzie, i know that things are going to work out for you!!!

[jana]

Liz, I don't have many answers for you, but here are the one's I do...

2. After talking with Integramed, it is our understanding that they can drop us at anytime and we still get 70% back. We also can elect to stop at any point and get the 70% back.

3. This one I think is optional, but at our clinic I think they go ahead and include it in our price.

4. Does the plan cover assisted hatching? Not sure. I know that we were never billed for AH with our FET.

5. It covers FETs only if you have leftover embryos. Does it cover freezing? No, ourd doesn't cover freezing, but our clinic only charges $200 for 6 months. All aspects of FET? Since FET is so different from a fresh, there wasn't a whole lot to cover, at least for us.

5. Are all labs, ultrasounds, ER, and ET covered? How about anesthesia? Is this covered too? What about the baseline ultrasound and the beta? The follow up appointment after beta? Embryo glue? Anything else I'm missing? Here's what it covered for us.....5 office visits, 5 ultrasounds, 5 E2 labs, ER, IVF lab fee, ET, ICSI, hospital fee....totaling $8065. We paid for all meds and anesthesia. Our insurance paid for betas. Not sure about glue.

Good luck with the decision. If you want to know anything else about the program, you can PM me.

[LGB]

We are on Integramed's Shared Risk plan right now, just had our 1st IVF cycle fail-here are some answers for you:

1. Will they take someone who has had a failed cycle if the rest of their numbers are good (good FSH, E2 sperm, etc.)?

We didn't have any failed cycles, but they do look at FSH (want it under 10 but mine was 10.1 and they took me), antral follicle count (want more than 10 but took me with 6 and 11), they didn't ask for my estrogen, but my RE recommended I do an AMH test bc they thought the results would help me, which they did, my AMH was 2.1. I don't think they looked at sperm.

2. How does the refund program really work? It says that you can opt out even if you have not completed all 3 cycles and still get you refund. Do you get the full 70% refund when you opt out early? So - say I get through with cycle #1 and decide I want to switch to an RE who is not part of their program. Do I get back 70% of what I paid? Or say I am emotionally done after 2 cycles? I still get back the 70%?

Yes, 70% if they terminate you or you cancel them. However, I didn't realize that after each failed cycle you have to be approved again before another cycle-your RE has to fax them the results, then they look it over and fax back 1 of 3 things: 1 approved to do another cyle, 2 not approved and terminated, 3 need more information from RE regarding cycle before determination can be made. So, they can terminate you at any time if say, your cycle went bad, your embryos were poor, you didn't stim well, etc.

3. The site says that you can add ICSI into your plan for extra. How much extra are we talking about?

I think it cost us $1050 more

4. Does the plan cover assisted hatching?

No, it doesn't cover AH

5. It covers FETs only if you have leftover embryos. Does it cover freezing? All aspects of FET?

No, it doesn't cover freezing.

5. Are all labs, ultrasounds, ER, and ET covered? How about anesthesia? Is this covered too? What about the baseline ultrasound and the beta? The follow up appointment after beta? Embryo glue? Anything else I'm missing?

It does cover all labs, BW and U/S, and baseline, but does not cover anesthesia (ours was $500-other shared risks do, like from ARC but this one doesn't and I didn't realize that!). Your beta goes back to being covered by insurance, not covered by shared risk. I didn't use embryo glue so I don't know.

We are about to terminate bc we want to switch practices and the new one doesn't use Integramed. It takes 30 days to get your money back. So, all in all, we will have spent $7,000 for one cycle with ICSI, not too bad. Also, you can get a loan with Capital One (rates start at 1.9%) and they work directly with Integramed-if you drop the program, Capital One sends you your refund from them too. One thing that I just found out is, your RE is not "sharing the risk" with you the patient, it's Integramed who is sharing the risk with you so I sort of feel that this takes owness OFF of your RE to make it work, if you know what I mean.

Hope this helps!

[BottleBrunette]

here is the $500 off coupon ladies

IVF Coupon - Save $500 on IVF

it expires on halloween

[~Rae~]

I'm currently pregnant off of my first cycle and I purchased a 3 cycle plus!
I could not be happier. The comfort of knowing that I have more tries if I don't take a healthy baby home...it's just so worth it. I paid $15,900 for 3 cycles and one alone at my clinic is $8,000. I had to pay $500 for drugs for ER and another $500 in case we had any frozen embryos leftover. We don't, so I should be receiving a refund for that money.


I know that I may end up paying for more than I would have for just one cycle. But, the piece of mind that comes with the idea that if I miscarry, deliver too early, or any number of things that could cause us to lose this (or these) baby(ies), I'll still get another chance...there's just no price a person can put on that, really.

[LGB]

I just found out that we are "approved" again to do a 2nd IVF cycle with Integramed's Shared Risk Plan. My 1st cycle I only had 10 eggs retrieved and 3 embryos fertilized (poor quality) so we thought for sure that they would drop us. But supposedly they go by the recommendation of the RE, who in our case, told them "potential for success merits a 2nd cycle". So, we'll see how it goes!

[Krista]

Lizzie- thanks for posting this thread. My clinic is an Integramed clinic and we're thinking about the shared risk program. You've given me more food for thought before our appt tuesday morning! I hope we're approved, though the Dr thinks it won't be a problem.

[LGB]

Originally Posted by Krista

Lizzie- thanks for posting this thread. My clinic is an Integramed clinic and we're thinking about the shared risk program. You've given me more food for thought before our appt tuesday morning! I hope we're approved, though the Dr thinks it won't be a problem.

We were quite worried about being approved bc of my slightly elevated FSH and so-so antral follicle count. But, we were approved! My RE said that they poretty listen to the REs opinion and recommendation so you should be just fine-good luck!!!

[LGB]

Originally Posted by lizzie518

We have had one failed IVF and one FET in which the blasts did not survive the thaw. We are switching REs and will be with one that only provides shared risk through integramed. I will be calling integramed tomorrow morning to see if I qualify, but have some questions for those of you who are in their program or have tried to qualify:

1. Will they take someone who has had a failed cycle if the rest of their numbers are good (good FSH, E2 sperm, etc.)?

2. How does the refund program really work? It says that you can opt out even if you have not completed all 3 cycles and still get you refund. Do you get the full 70% refund when you opt out early? So - say I get through with cycle #1 and decide I want to switch to an RE who is not part of their program. Do I get back 70% of what I paid? Or say I am emotionally done after 2 cycles? I still get back the 70%?

3. The site says that you can add ICSI into your plan for extra. How much extra are we talking about?

4. Does the plan cover assisted hatching?

5. It covers FETs only if you have leftover embryos. Does it cover freezing? All aspects of FET?

5. Are all labs, ultrasounds, ER, and ET covered? How about anesthesia? Is this covered too? What about the baseline ultrasound and the beta? The follow up appointment after beta? Embryo glue? Anything else I'm missing?

Has anyone had any positive or negative dealings with the plan? You can PM me if you prefer not to make negative comments on here.

Thanks ladies!

I just remember one thing that we weren't aware of before we started our 1st IVF cycle that might be of interest to you...it was written in the contract but since we were total IVF newbies, this meant absolutely nothing to us!

If your cycle in cancelled or converted into an IUI on your 1st attempt, you are automactically dropped from the program and get a 90% refund.

If your cycle if cancelled or converted into an IUI on your 2nd or 3rd attempts, you are automatically dropped an get back 70%.

My 1st cycle was quite poor with fewer eggs (10 retrieved), but the RE pushed us thru so we wouldn't get dropped from Shared Risk. In the end it was a toss up bc we didn't get pg. and spent all that money for meds when my response was very low, but we didn't get dropped from the shared risk.