Stimulation medicines are given to stimulate your ovaries to produce many follicles, which are fluid filled sacs containing eggs. All stimulation medicines contain the hormone, FSH, which stands for Follicle Stimulating Hormone. There are many different stimulation medicines, including Menopur, Gonal F, Meriofert, Follitropin and Bemfola. Sometimes your doctors may suggest using a combination of these medicines. These injections are normally given daily.

You are likely to have several scans during your IVF or ICSI treatment. You may have a scan to confirm that you have achieved down-regulation (when the linining of the womb is expected to be thin and the ovaries to be inactive without any large follicles). During the stimulation phase you will have several scans to ensure the follicles are growing and the lining of the womb is thickening appropriately.

This is a very imporant injection. It is given to achieve final maturation of the eggs before eggs are collected. The hormone hCG is normally used for this purpose. It is very imporant to time this injection right. It is REALLY IMPORANT THAT YOU GET SPECIFIC ADVICE FROM YOUR CLINIC about the timing of this injection.

This will depend on embryo development and quality. It may be 2 or 3 days after egg collection (cleavage stage embryo transfer) or 4 or 5 days after egg collection (blastocyst transfer).

We suggest you do this 16 days after egg collection.

Your partner can attend all of the appoitments with you, but the absolutely mandatory date to attend is on the day of egg collection. Your partner will need to produce a semen sample on that day as well as take you home after the operation and look after you for at least 24 hours following the egg collection operation. We will also advise attending on the day of embryo transfer.

The start of the treatment will normally depend on the treatment ‘protocol’ (a fancy name for your specific treatment plan!) as well as the first day of the menstrual cycle in which your treatment is scheduled to start. Our IVF calendar can help calculate treatment start date and other key event dates, but you much ensure you have selected the correct treatment protocol with the help of your IVF clinic.

Down-regulation, also known as pituitary suppression, is given to to ensure that you don’t release the eggs too early before the actual date of egg collection. Down-regulation can be achieved with a GnRH agonist injection (e.g. Buserelin) or a GnRH antagonist injection (e.g. Cetrotide). The injections are normally given daily.