Embryo Road Trip: Navigating the Journey from Clinic to Clinic

Buckle up for a special episode of "Taco Bout Fertility Tuesday" where we embark on an 'Embryo Road Trip: Navigating the Journey from Clinic to Clinic.' Imagine packing up your most precious cargo and hitting the road – but this time, it's not your family heading on vacation; it's your embryos! We're delving into the intricate process of transferring cryopreserved embryos between fertility clinics. From the science behind keeping these tiny travelers safe and sound in their frosty containers to the logistics that govern their journey, we cover it all. Join us as we shed light on the risks, the must-knows. Whether you're a hopeful parent-to-be or just curious about this fascinating aspect of reproductive medicine, this episode is your ticket to understanding the complexities and adventures of embryo transportation. So, let's hit the road and talk about fertility in a way only we can! 🚚👶🧊🌐🎙️ #EmbryoRoadTrip #FertilityJourney #TacoBoutFertilityTuesday

Thanks for tuning in to another episode of 'Taco Bout Fertility Tuesday' with Dr. Mark Amols. If you found this episode insightful, please share it with friends and family who might benefit from our discussion. Remember, your feedback is invaluable to us – leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your preferred listening platform.

Stay connected with us for updates and fertility tips – follow us on Facebook. For more resources and information, visit our website at www.NewDirectionFertility.com.

Have a question or a topic you'd like us to cover? We'd love to hear from you! Reach out to us at TBFT@NewDirectionFertility.com.

Join us next Tuesday for more discussions on fertility, where we blend medical expertise with a touch of humor to make complex topics accessible and engaging. Until then, keep the conversation going and remember: understanding your fertility is a journey we're on together.

Transcript

0:00

It. Whether you have gone through IVF, frozen your eggs, or frozen sperm, at some point you may have a decision, and that is to use your crowd preserved materials at the clinic you're at or move them to another clinic. Today we talk about that road trip your crowd preserved materials need to go. On, and what are the risk and. The benefits, and what navigating that journey is like. I'm, Dr. Mark Amos, and this is taco, about fertility Tuesday. If anyone has ever seen the movie where Chevy Chase is going to Wally World, you know that sometimes these road trips can be quite dangerous. The question is, are the road trips for your crowdsourcer materials going to be dangerous? For most patients, this is never even going to come up. And that's because for most patients, you just keep doing everything at the same clinic. But there are many reasons why you might need to move your embryos. Possibly you moved, and now it's very difficult to do a transfer at that place. Maybe when you were younger, you froze. Sperm because you had a surgical procedure, and now you want to have a baby with your family and that was in a different state. Or you froze your eggs when you were in New York working on a big time job, and now you live in Arizona and don't want to go back to New York to untaw those eggs and make embryos. I've even had patients who did IVF in other countries, and it was too expensive to go back to those countries, so brought their embryos back to the. States where we did an embryo transfer. Whatever the reason is, there are some. Important things to think about before you. Just take that trip. So let's start off first by talking about what is the real risk? Is there a lot of risk from taking your embryos and making them go through the trip to another clinic? The simple answer is no, there's not that much risk. Most of the companies who do this. Do this all the time, and the. Embryos are shipped in a special container to protect them, which I'll go over. In a little bit. But there are more than one way to transfer things like embryos, eggs and sperm. Some people do it themselves, which is a very reasonable way to do it. Because it can save money. And essentially what happens is the place. That'S going to send them gets the container ready. And if you're in town, you go. And you get that container, you bring it in your car, and you drive it over to the next clinic and. Move your eggs, embryos or sperm. The reason why this is safe is because these crowd preserved materials are not. Technically in liquid nitrogen. Instead, they're in a device that creates a vapor. And the way it does that is. It'S charged and it keeps everything cold, just like it's in liquid nitrogen. But this way, if it tips over, it still keeps everything cold and nothing happens to your crowd preserved materials. You could literally get in a car crash and probably things would be fine because that container is then in a giant, like, mushroom cloud type of thing that's pretty big. And that usually will sit in the. Back of your car seatbelt. Then when you're moving to other clinics. Now, when you use a company like Cryoport, which is one of the companies out there, what they'll do is they'll. Do the same things. But now they have someone as a middleman and obviously they can guarantee things. And so it puts a little less on the line because there's someone you can blame if something goes wrong, which again, is extremely rare. So then that settles everything. It's not worrisome, and anyone should be. Feel free to move their embryos, move. Their sperm and move their eggs. Well, not so fast. See, the issue isn't having the sperm, eggs or embryos moving. That part is actually very, very simple. And like I said, rarely becomes a problem. The issue is that when you are. Transferring material to another clinic, the question. Is, do they know how to thaw it as well as the last place? And this takes us to the point that thawing is sometimes different at every clinic. Now, every place might use a different. Straw, different places may use different materials. And so imagine if you worked hard. To make these eggs or these embryos, and now it goes to a clinic. Who'S never used this methodology, and now. They'Re thawing it and they lose your embryos. Now, again, this is not very common, but it still is an important thing to understand. I actually have a case where someone did take their embryo and they moved away from Arizona. They went and brought to their clinic. That clinic thought it and then said. They didn't see the embryo. And we were a little bit curious about that because we thought, that's strange. Did Dambro just, not survive the thaw? And that's what they told him, because that does happen. A lot of the places bane just. Tell you it didn't survive the thaw. When in reality there could have been something wrong. And the thing was, when we spoke. To them, they said something very, very concerning to us. They said, have you ever had pregnancies with these straws? And that concerned us because what that. Told me was, is that that clinic. Has never used that straw before, because if they had, they would have known. There's plenty of pregnancies with that type of straw. And this is one of my biggest. Concerns about people moving embryos between clinics. You really need to make sure. Have they worked with the same straws with the same protocols? None of them are difficult to the point that other people can't learn it. But do you really want them learning it on their very first try? No, you want someone who's done this protocol before. And so if you are transferring your embryos, you need to make sure. Is that clinic asking for all the paperwork first to make sure that they can accept embryos? That's one thing we do at our clinic. We will not accept a single embryo. Unless we know that we have used. That straw before and that we know that methodology for thawing them. Like I said, these are professionals. I have no doubt they can do it. But again, if it's just one embryo. Do you really want to take that risk? This even becomes more important when you're. Talking about frozen eggs. I see this all the time. People have frozen eggs. They'll just ship them across the country and have another place thaw them. And m the problem with that is. That the place that froze them knows their protocol backwards and forwards. They could close their eyes and do it. Now you have another clinic who's sitting. There looking at a paper, going through the motions, and again, they're not going. To be as fast. And that stuff matters. Seconds matters when you're doing these type of thaws. So personally, I feel anytime you're moving embryos or eggs, you need to verify. That the place is familiar with that methodology. Now, when it comes to sperm, it's a little bit different. Sperm thaws and freezes very well. Honestly, someone could be bad at what they do, and they're probably going to still be able to get plenty of sperm, so I wouldn't be too worried about sperm. Feel free to move that all over. The place where you want. But when it comes to embryos and. Eggs, I would highly recommend that you make sure the clinic has used not. Just the straw before, but also has used that methodology for thawing. I tell every single patient who wants. To bring embryos to my clinic, don't. I say you're better off leaving them there and doing the transfer there because they know their process the best. Now, does that mean I say they can't bring them? No, because the risk is so small. I have very good embryologists just like other places have good embryologists. But I still realize the difference, that. They'Re going to know their process better. And for that reason, I do recommend. People stay with the clinic to do their transfer. That is not always an option. There are times people cannot go back to that clinic for many reasons. And, in that situation, don't be worried. Yes, it may affect your chances a tiny bit, but we're talking about a small amount. So why do I bring this up? Because there are some of us who only get one shot. And so if you're one of those. Patients who only gets one shot at. This, you might not want to move. Your embryos, because in that situation, what. If the other clinic, again, doesn't know. The methodology and that small, maybe 1%. Or 2% chance something goes wrong? And now you don't have an embryo to transfer, or it's been compromised and. Now won't work as well? It doesn't mean that same issue couldn't happen at the previous claim, but at least then, you know, they know their processes, and it happened just at the chance, not due to something that happened in the thought process. I am almost sure that almost no one in the medical community in Ra. Probably agrees me with this, and that's because the risk is very small. But I've been down this road, and. One to 2% might be an, important thing. And just like that one clank did. It only proved what I was worried about. Why is anyone accepting an embryo if they don't know how to use the straw we were using, if they don't. Know if there's pregnancy rates from it? That worries me. And so if we ever accept an embryo, we tell them whether we've used. That methodology before or used that straw before. And if we haven't, we're going to. Tell them and say, we don't recommend you bringing it here. If they still want to, we just say them, understand there is risk. We'll do the best we can, but. We have not used this. And there's these small little things you learn in your job. Everybody can get good at something, but to get great at something, it takes time. You have to deal with some of the issues that occur, and then you learn from it. And that's the problem. When someone does something new for the. First time, I'm sure they'll do well most of the time, but once in. A while, it could end in a bad outcome. And unfortunately, if that's your only embryo, that can be devastating. Now, if you got, like, 20. Embryos or a whole bunch. Yeah, probably. Don't be too worried. No big deal. Even, if you lost one, you have 20, you can say, okay, I'm willing to take that small, small risk. So the point is, is it wrong to move your embryos? Absolutely not. People do it every day, and I'm not saying you shouldn't. What I wanted to make sure, you. Know, is that actually moving them has. Very, very low risk. People do it all the time, and there is no issues. I honestly have never even heard of an issue when someone was traveling with embryos that, something went wrong. In addition, I have never heard of someone, even locally, moving embryos and having. A problem with the delivery of the. Embryos to the other place. However, I have personally had examples of. Where embryos have been transferred and things don't go well. And the patient's told, oh, it didn't survive the thaw or vice versa. We've had things that, sent to us that we didn't feel comfortable with. We've told the patient that, and unfortunately. One of them m didn't survive the thaw, and it popped on this type. Of straw called a cryoloop that actually had some issues. And so my point is to reassure you, you shouldn't be worried about moving embryos. But there is always that concern that the place that's getting it, if they're. Not familiar with that method, you should be concerned. And so just be an advocate. Make sure the clinic has used that straw before. Make sure that clinic has used that methodology for thawing. That way you can at least be. Sure that they know what they're doing. When they do it. And most of them are going to be able to. Because, again, a lot of these protocols. Are similar, and a lot of the straws are similar, but sometimes they're not. And that's when you got, to make sure. And this is truly important for eggs. Eggs are a little bit more fragile than embryos. And so you really do want someone who knows the methodology. And the thing is that the longer. It'S been, fewer people are going to know that methodology. Because the way we froze things in. The past is different than we freeze now. Even the equipment we use, the straws, are different today than they were in the past. And so it's important that if you. Are transferring embryos or crop preserved materials to a clinic, and it's from a. Clinic that from, let's say, 15 years. Ago, you really need to make sure. That they are familiar with this method. And if not, find a clinic that is. I'm not saying a clinic is bad to accept your embryos without checking those. Things, but I honestly think as a. Clinic, we should be advocates for our. Patients and we should verify, and not. All clinics are going to do that. So you need to be the advocate. For yourself and verify. Have they used that straw before? And also, have they ever used that. Methodology before, before sending your embryos there? But in the end, if they have. I think you can feel very comfortable. Transferring embryos and not worried that, like. Chevy Chase, you're going to have a. Horrible journey on the way to Wally World. Hopefully this episode was helpful for you. If you're thinking about moving embryos or if it ever comes up, you'll remember this. And even if it's not for you, maybe you have a friend that, this may affect and you can talk to them and let them know about this podcast. As always, I greatly appreciate everyone that listens to this podcast. And again, if you like us, tell your friends about us. Give us a good review. I won't keep harping on this, but want to make sure you know that we have started a new show called Sperm Meets Egg. You can go to the website spermmeatsegg.com and this is a pretty interactive show where you can actually call in and talk to us about your fertility questions or maybe even your journey. And both myself, Dr. Salem, and sometimes even another guest will be there to answer them. It's kind of a unique version of kind of like the podcast, but instead of me giving the topics, you give the topics and then we answer them directly on live Internet tv. I look forward to talking to you guys again next week on Talk about fertility Tuesday.