Infertility Cost
Fertility treatment cost are normally only covered partially or not at all by most health insurance policies.
It is very important to find out exactly what is covered and what not if your policy does cover infertility treatments.
Your doctor don’t know the ins and outs of your individual health plan. The doctor’s office will only be able to advise you on your co-payments.
If you are part of a flexible spending account program, that allow you to cover medical expenses from your pre-tax dollars, then you can use that.
Make sure you know exactly what you will be responsible for before you start any infertility program.
Investigating all the options and costs will prevent many sleepless nights and unexpected bills.
According to the American Society of Reproductive Medicine one cycle of IVF can cost anything from $12,000.00 or more.
Just keep in mind that this will be differ on a case by case basis depending on your circumstances.
This can seem very expensive especially if taking into account that the success rate of IVF is only around 30% and it normally take several rounds of treatments to fall pregnant.
Especially for couples in that is in their late 30’s and older.
IVF technology keeps evolving and getting better and so are the different options available.
If the last available option open to you is IVF, to fulfill your desire to become a parent, then just remember that it will be a challenging time.
It is then up to the individual to look into the various options and the associated costs.
The first, but not the only cost, is a financial one.
We have already mentioned that the financial cost can be anything from $12,000.00 upwards depending on the individual circumstances.
To budget for the personal expenses you will need to find out from your insurance exactly what is covered.
It is then time to decide were this money is going to be coming from.
Some people prioritize by deferring some major purchases they had in mind and to use some funds from personal savings or medical savings or retirement funds. Even then the cost of IVF may be seen as something that is just too costly.
This can be seen, especially for a young couple, to be out of their financial reach.
But this have to be weighed up against the higher IVF success rate, the younger the couple are.
Some IVF centers realize that cost is a major obstacle and now offer financing options.
Some even offer guarantees of a refund or partial refund if the IVF treatment don’t result in a viable full term pregnancy.
The second cost is the cost of timing.
The further the woman’s age is over 35 the more crucial this cost become. The younger the women the less crucial time is.
Their is a second factor to time, apart from age, and that is the time that have to be spend for the IVF treatments. That could have been spent on over more enjoyable lifestyle things.
Then there is the third cost and this is the risks associated with IVF treatments.
As with any medical treatment their is always some risk involved. Studies show that the risk of the actual IVF related procedures are in general no more than with other medical treatments.
The major risk involved is that of a pregnancy with twins or triplets and the associated risks of premature labor and low birth weight.
The fourth and often the most important cost is the emotional cost or psychological trauma associated with infertility.
Infertility affect our core believes about ourselves and the way we belief society see us as women, lovers, men, providers, wives and husbands. Our believe about how conception should occur, if it doesn’t, our perceived failures as partners and how this affect our marriages and sex lives.
Then their is also the unspoken thoughts in the back of the mind of what if this don’t work. What then, is adoption an issue that have to be faced?
It is best to investigate and weigh up the pros and cons of all the different infertility cost issues with a clear mind and make an informed decision.
