IVF with your own eggs 

Your IVF Coordinator, who will look after you throughout the treatment process, will arrange an initial personal consultation with your doctor.

During your visit, your doctor will discuss your personal medical history and perform the necessary basic examinations to design an individual treatment plan.

A woman’s fertility examination includes a gynaecological examination, cervical smears, ultrasound examination and testing for venereal disease. The first visit also includes a blood test to determine the hormonal situation in the woman’s body and the function of the thyroid gland.

The male fertility examination consists of a spermogram and a blood test for venereal disease. Your doctor may recommend further examinations according to the established medical history.

Led by the results of the initial examinations, your doctor will propose a personalised treatment plan as well as a stimulation protocol. Typically, hormonal stimulation involves medication prescribed by the doctor and lasts 8 to 10 days. The aim of the simulation is to obtain an optimal number of quality eggs.

Based on an analysis of an ultrasound examination, which takes place approximately one week after stimulation, the doctor will determine a suitable date for egg retrieval, which will be carried out at our clinic.

The procedure will be performed under a short anaesthetic, and our embryologists will immediately check the collected eggs and determine which ones have the best chance to fertilise and mature.

Minimal (or soft) stimulation is a process in which you inject yourself with low doses of medication, ideally resulting in gaining two to six eggs suitable for fertilisation.

Selected, mature and high-quality eggs are fertilised by embryologists in the laboratory with your partner’s most vital sperm. You can also use your partner’s previously frozen sperm or, if necessary, donor sperm.

At this stage, you can choose some of the laboratory methods that increase the success rate of IVF treatment. Intracytoplasmic sperm injection or ICSI is the most commonly used fertilisation method, in which an embryologist injects selected sperm directly into the egg.

To select optimal sperm, we can use the Microfluidic Chip-Based Sperm Selection or MICHSS method, which mimics the natural environment of the fallopian tubes and allows only sperm with the best chance of success to pass through the membrane.

Another advanced method is OptimFert. This innovation allows you to determine the appropriate time for fertilisation of the eggs, using a special polarising microscope.

The native, or natural, cycle takes place without hormonal stimulation. This is aimed at obtaining one egg, which is then fertilised by embryologists.

For several days, the fertilised eggs develop in our embryology laboratory. In a normal cycle, this part of the process lasts two to five days. At this stage, you can choose time-lapse monitoring, a method in which our experts in the laboratory monitor the continuous development of the embryos using a camera. A main benefit of using this technology is that this monitoring can take place without having to disturb the cultivation conditions by checking them under a microscope.

The day after fertilisation of the eggs, we will inform you about the number of developing embryos. Detailed information about the quality, development and number of embryos, including any time-lapse monitoring recordings, will be explained by the embryologist at a personal consultation on the day of transfer. The embryologist will talk everything through with you and is ready to answer your questions.

The transfer of the embryo into the uterus takes place at our clinic and is a short, simple and painless process in which the doctor transfers the selected embryo into the uterus aided by ultrasound.

Even at this early stage, you can choose additional laboratory methods that can increase the chances of successful implantation.

Laser-assisted hatching, or LAZT, is a method in which embryologists use a non-contact laser to thin the protective envelope of the embryo, the zona pellucida, making it easier for the embryo to dissolve and subsequently nest.

You can also use EmbryoGlue®, which is a solution that mimics the conditions in the uterus and helps implantation after the transfer.

After the egg transfer, closely follow the rest regime recommended by your doctor. This means avoiding heavy physical activity, including sports and lifting heavy objects. Also, you should refrain from sexual intercourse and having overly hot baths or saunas. Your doctor is also likely to recommend that you relax, try to unwind and think positively.

Your doctor will instruct you on the appropriate time to take a pregnancy test after the embryo transfer, usually on day 14. In the case of a positive test, you will undergo another examination either at our clinic or by your own doctor to confirm the test result. Your doctor will then recommend the next course of action.

If your urine test for pregnancy comes back negative, we recommend a blood test. If this test also is negative, you will be taken off the medication as recommended by your doctor.

You will discuss the next steps with your doctor. Depending on the situation, you can use frozen embryos for the next transfer. In the case of further stimulation, the doctor will carefully evaluate the outcome and may suggest adjusting the treatment plan or using other complementary methods to increase the chances of pregnancy.

You can undergo another stimulation depending on how your doctor assesses your personal situation. This can take place, at the earliest, after 2 months.