Here at my apartment, the FedEx guy always seems to arrive with packages around noontime. The UPS guy always seems to deliver between 4pm-6pm. When I saw the FedEx truck pull around the parking lot at 12:43pm today I just knew he was stopping by with my precious cargo, and I was right! My baby-in-a-box had arrived!
So when combining today's shipment with what I already had, the picture above is the astounding amount of meds that I will use for this IVF cycle.
For stims, I have 9 boxes of Bravelle and 6 boxes of Menopur. This is a ridiculous amount of stims but they are anticipating my low response so they ordered accordingly. These two medicines have to be reconstituted before use. So each box has 5 - 75iu vials of the med and 5 vials of sodium chloride to use as the diluant (Bravelle vials in the pic below.) Once I get started on 10/8, I'll find out how many vials of the med I need to one vial of the diluant (e.g. If I have to do 225iu of Bravelle, I would need to mix 1 vial of diluant into 3 vials of med.) The every-other-day u/s and blood work is what guides them into adjusting the dosages as needed. All I can say is thank god they have videos for mixing and injecting these meds or I think I'd get lost in it all.
9 boxes of Bravelle = $2047.75 (after $200 coupon)
6 boxes of Menopur = $1977.00
For the antagonist injections, I have 4 pre-filled injections of Ganirelix. Towards the end of the stim period (usually when follicles reach a certain size) I'll use these injections in addition to the stims to prevent ovulation from occurring on it's own. 4 injections of Ganirelix = $344
For the trigger (done exactly 34-36 hours before egg retrieval), I have 2 Ovidrel pre-filled injections (1 shown below). This is the only med I need to keep in the refrigerator.
2 Ovidrel injections = $100
Also displayed on the table:
So when combining today's shipment with what I already had, the picture above is the astounding amount of meds that I will use for this IVF cycle.
For stims, I have 9 boxes of Bravelle and 6 boxes of Menopur. This is a ridiculous amount of stims but they are anticipating my low response so they ordered accordingly. These two medicines have to be reconstituted before use. So each box has 5 - 75iu vials of the med and 5 vials of sodium chloride to use as the diluant (Bravelle vials in the pic below.) Once I get started on 10/8, I'll find out how many vials of the med I need to one vial of the diluant (e.g. If I have to do 225iu of Bravelle, I would need to mix 1 vial of diluant into 3 vials of med.) The every-other-day u/s and blood work is what guides them into adjusting the dosages as needed. All I can say is thank god they have videos for mixing and injecting these meds or I think I'd get lost in it all.
9 boxes of Bravelle = $2047.75 (after $200 coupon)
6 boxes of Menopur = $1977.00
For the antagonist injections, I have 4 pre-filled injections of Ganirelix. Towards the end of the stim period (usually when follicles reach a certain size) I'll use these injections in addition to the stims to prevent ovulation from occurring on it's own. 4 injections of Ganirelix = $344
For the trigger (done exactly 34-36 hours before egg retrieval), I have 2 Ovidrel pre-filled injections (1 shown below). This is the only med I need to keep in the refrigerator.
2 Ovidrel injections = $100
Also displayed on the table:
- 1 pack BCPS (only a few more days of those to take) = $3
- 2 packs of azithromycin (antibiotic - 1 pack I'm almost done with, 1 pack I'll start before E/R) $23
- a bottle of 90 estradiol tablets (estrogen) - these start around the time of transfer, I believe until I'm 12 weeks pregnant - if I don't get pregnant, I stop taking them the day of the negative beta. $40
- a bottle of 5 methylprednisone tablets - no clue what this is for, but at my appointment on 10/18 I'm supposed to bring all of my meds so they can review them with me...so will know more then. $15
- 2 boxes of Endometrin vaginal suppositories - each box contains 21 suppositories and 21 "plungers". Nice. I'll start inserting these hard tablets into the poor hoo-ha 3x a day from time of transfer until I'm 12 weeks pregnant (yeah, like I said poor hoo-ha) - if I don't get pregnant, I can of course stop these the day of the negative beta. $159.98 (after $20 coupon)
- 3 sharps containers (I certainly don't need 3, but since they came from 2 different pharmacies on 3 different occasions, I now have 3 of them) - $0
- Assortment of syringes and needles - the syringes with longer needles are used to suck up the Bravelle & Menopur out of the vials. Then right before injecting myself, I can switch the needle out to a small one since the injections are sub-cutaneous. $10
- Alcohol pads, guaze pads, etc - gotta keep it sanitary you know - $0
And so that's what $4719.73 worth of medications look like (and hey, when I add it all up it's $10 less than I estimated yesterday...bargain!!) Pretty crazy, huh?!?
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