Let's Talk Infertility

Join Sueann & Kim as they talk about their personal experiences with fertility testing.

We're delighted to have Red Miller to join us tonight to discuss taking a holistic approach to infertility. Red Miller is an IVF Mum, Midwife, Author and the founder of Love Based Birth. She has a special interest in helping couples transform fear so they can avoid fear-based making decisions; and that has helped thousands of couples do exactly that. Red has attended nearly 800 births in more than 10 countries including Nepal, USA and Singapore and in diverse places such as the rice fields of Cambodia to a palace. In tonight's episode we will discuss:- 00:00 - Introduction of the Topic 3:10 - Introduction of Red Miller 3:58 - Making decisions without Fear 7:32 - Tips to optimise holistic health during preconception 10:44 - Mind-Body connection and spirit-baby connection 27:10 - Holistic supplements; and 30:26 - Reducing Household Chemicals

We're delighted to have Dr Janice Tung from Thomson fertility centre joining us to discuss the topic of Male Infertility. Questions answered:- 00:00 - Introduction 0:49 - Introduction of Dr Janice Tung 1:50 - What constitutes Male Infertility and When should you get help? 3:55 - What can we do to improve Teratozoospermia? 6:27 - Vitamins men can take to help improve sperm count 6:53 - How to improve Sperm Morphology? 7:10 - What is Oligozoospermia? 8:29 - What is the impact of poor sperm quality on the success rates of IVF? 9:38 - What about Azoospermia? 10:44 - MicroTESE 11:28 - When a blastocyst stops growing after day 3 or 4, is sperm a high possible reason for this cause? 13:01 - Other factors to look at for IVF failure 13:39 - Does it make it easier if the problem within the couple is male infertility issues? in particular low sperm count? 15:04 - Is donor sperm allowed in Singapore? 15:59 - Does a strict diet play a part in improving fertility for both genders? 17:10 - Is a dead end scenario for Male infertility? when does one decide to go for donor sperm? 18:18 - Is it hard for men to accept male infertility being a problem? How to support your husband emotionally during this journey? 22:34 - What support is there for male infertility here in Singapore? 23:02 - Can a morphology of less than 4% be a reason for not being able to conceive a baby? 24:00 - Is there any treatment for Male Hypogonadism and is there anything that can be done to improve quality? 25:28 - Will sperm quality affect the % of fertilisation even when its done with ICSI? 26:14 - Some foods or vitamins that can improve sperm count? 28:34 - Is Dr Janice Tung seeing more cases of male infertility issues?

Join us as Atarah from Sincere Healthcare Group13:40 answers our questions on how a private IVF clinic differs to a public hospital. 00:00 - Introduction to the Topic 3:58 - Atarah's Introduction of Sincere Healthcare Group 5:33 - How does fertility checks differ between a private clinic and a public hospital? 6:17 - DNA Fragmentation Tests, OSA Tests and HBA Tests for Male Sperm 7:42 - What can be done to help men who face problems with the tests mentioned before? 8:55 - Are fertility checks more expensive at private clinics when compared to public hospitals? 11:34 - Supplements to help improve fertility 13:40 - Difference between timeframes in a private clinic versus a public hospital 15:40 - When to start IVF stimulation? 16:35 - Why do public hospital wait an extra month to do an endoscratch? 17:21 - How do labs and embryologists differ between private clinics and public hospitals? 18:16 - Does sincere usually transfer day 3 embryos or day 5 blasts? 19:02 - Where are IVF procedures done? 19:46 - Would patients with Low AMH stand a better chance at a private clinic? 21:18 - Does the embryologist do anything extra to help the embryo grow? 22:04 - What are Sincere Clinic's success rates? 23:04 - Does Sincere Clinic mainly do Fresh or Frozen Transfers? 24:15 - Does sincere do unmedicated frozen transfers? 24:50 - Is PGS/PGD testing available in Sincere Clinic? 25:20 - PGS/PGD testing in Malaysia JB 26:23 - Cost of PGD/PGS testing in Malaysia 29:15 - Does Sincere clinic accept frozen embryos from public hospitals 30:08 - Embryo transportation during transfer from one place to another 32:30 - Cost to transfer embryos over from public hospitals to private clinic 33:30 - Cost of IVF public vs private clinic 35:40 - Payment methods available 36:42 - Why choose a private clinic?

In today's talk, we talk to Dr Roland Chieng & Dr Liow Swee Lian from @virtusfertilitycentre for our talk about PGD & PGS Testing in Singapore! 00:00 - Introduction to the topic 6:27 - Introduction of the doctors 8:05 - What is the difference between PGD & PGS? 10:15 - What test should a couple do if they gave genetic abnormalities? 11:09 - Who should get these tests done? 11:31 - Should a couple who have failed a few IVFs or had a few miscarriages get tested? 13:28 - Does Virtus have a lab to run PGD & PGD Testing? 14:23 - Why is it taking so long to embrace PGD testing in Singapore? 16:20 - If embryos have already been tested for PGD/PGS, can a couple skip the future genetic tests like OSCAR/NIPT etc after getting pregnant? 17:40 - If a lady has very few embryos but has been recommended for PGS testing, is it still worth doing? 18:33 - Is there any secret method to increase the number of blasts a couple can get? 20:55 - What is an average number a couple should have before sending the embryos for testing? 22:30 - Will a 4AA embryo that is sent for testing be a good embryo? 23:37 - Is there anything a lady should look out for before starting IVF stims? 25:28 - Would you recommend back to back stimulation for ladies who have very few embryos? 26:40 - What is your view on duo stimulation? 27:43 - If a couple has failed PGD/PGS testing, would you suggest using donor eggs or donor sperm? 30:51 - Will the covid-19 vaccination affect our embryos? 32:55 - Under what scenario should a lady proceed with embryo banking? 34:00 - Is secondary infertility getting more common? 35:20 - Do you recommend taking supplements? Are they important? 37:09 - What are the risks of the integrity of the embryos being affected during testing? 39:04 - Does virtus have a centre overseas for testing? 40:20 - Should a lady change doctors after not succeeding somewhere else? 42:53 - How does Virtus differ from a public hospital or a different private clinic? 44:23 - How important is an embryologist? 46:19 - What are the live birth rates for virtus for ladies over 35-40? 47:32 - What's the improvement in implantation rate after an ERA test?

- What are the live birth rates for women over 35 and over 40 at your clinic? 2020 or 2019 figures? - How does your clinic differ from public hospitals? - Is it important to choose the right doctor? - Are there lifestyle changes to be made prior to IVF? - How should one prepare the body for IVF? What types of supplements do you recommend? - Should men take supplements even if they don’t have any issues? - Do you think TCM is helpful for IVF? - Is it true stress and worry affect IVF results? - Is it easier to conceive after fibroid/polyps/endo removal surgery? - What tips do you have to improve womb and egg quality? - Do you freeze just eggs instead of embryos? Under what circumstances? - How many cycles would you advise your patients to try for IUI? For IVF? - When would you suggest using donor eggs for a patient? and where can we get donor eggs in Singapore? - What is the miscarriage rate for women above 35? - What would you advise someone with low AMH? - Who are human growth hormone injections like Saizen recommended for? - Why do some ovaries respond poorly to IVF stimulation? How can we increase better responsiveness? - Do you believe Day 3 embryos and Day 5 embryos make a difference? - Does embryo grading affect implantation success? - How can we improve implantation? - Do progressive injections help in FET? - Do you recommend transferring 1 or 2 embryos for ladies 35 years and above? - Is there a reason why ectopic pregnancies occur? Can it be prevented? - When you don’t succeed at a particular clinic after one IVF cycle, would you suggest changing to another doctor? - I’ve had both Fallopian tubes removed due to an ectopic pregnancy, what’s my chances for success for IVF? - I am a Adenomyosis patient, what would your approach be for me in IVF? - I have a liquid cyst, should I have it removed to have a higher chance of conceiving? - I am under 35 with low AMH. During stimulation, my follicle growth is extremely uneven resulting in poor retrieval numbers, what would you suggest? - I’ve gone through 2 retrievals with 7 and 8 eggs retrieved and fertilised but none have managed to survive till Day 3, What would you suggest? - I’ve had 3 miscarriages and we did karotyping and DNA fragmentation but no problems were found. What else wld u suggest we do?