Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Sticker Shock

In yesterdays post, I called my IVF coordinator Kim, but that's the name of my local coordinator, my NY coordinators name is Emily. Ooops. Anyway, Emily called me back and we talked dates etc. I explained the situation and she said that I could stay on bcp for 25 days to allow for test taking. :)

I'm not overly excited about the length of time I'll have to be on the pill (the pill usually makes me feel like complete shit) but it's better than waiting another cycle.

So today, Emily called me again to say that she talked to Kim and my local office doesn't do the Salinesongogram, I didn't even ask why. Now I have to make a seperate appointment for that at a radiologists office. The thing is, when I called around, the outpatient clinics don't often perform this procedure, so now I'm nervous about the quality of care they will provide. I'm going to call Emily tomorrow and see what she recommends.

She also gave me a list of my meds and called it in to Freed.om Pharmacy for me. I asked her if I had to use them or if I could call around. She seemed surprised that I would want to take the time, but she said sure.

Now for the sticker shock...I called Freed.om Pharmacy to find out the total...OMG, I think my heart may have stopped for a second. They quoted $8000. Maybe compared to some of your cycles out there, it's not so bad, but I was expecting around $5,000 (still too high IMO).

Fortunately I had my quotes from the last IVF and started calling around to all of the major pharmacies. So far the best quote has come from The Apoth.ecary Shop at about $5,000. Much more reasonable which is why I used them last time too.

I also just rememberd the stash of leftover IVF-1 drugs I had in my bedroom closet! I have four of the five ganirelix and a few menopur! Hopefully I'll make it far enough to need it this time. ;) If only my follistim hadn't already expired...

4 comments:

Pepper said...

Eight grand for meds is INSANE! My goodness. I'm glad you called around.

Sometimes docs will let you use expired meds. Nothing magical happens on the expiration date, after all. My doc allows patients to use meds up through about one month post expiration, so maybe the Follistim is still a contender.

Also, last cycle I called around and ended up saving a ton by getting the meds from the cheapest source. I got the HCG from pharmacy 1, the Meno.pur from pharmacy 2, and so on. Counting my local pharmacies, I probably used about five pharmacies in all. Yeah. I'm cheap. :-) But why pay more when a little bit of juggling can save you lots of dough?

Unknown said...

Wow! I certainly hope you can get some extra help with that so you don't have to pay that much!!

Pam said...

I'm not if you can, but I've heard of some people in the US ordering their meds from Canada. These guys - http://glenshieldspharmacy.com/ are one of the places they look at, and they've got a price list right on their website allowing you to make a reasonable comparison....plus they prices are in canadian funds. :)

Stephanie said...

Thanks for the suggestions. Actually, the follistim expired some time ago, so I gave it away. :)

I was fortunate enough to pick up some donated menopur, it's about to expire and I'll be using it as it does. Hopefully that won't make any difference.

I checked out the website, Pam, but they require prescriptions from a Canadian Dr. Thanks anyway.