FAQ - Travel
A semen analysis is a critical part of your fertility workup and the lack of one can result in a failed cycle (So you definitely should have one!!!); however, those clients wishing to decline this can do so by signing a waiver in your Consents Packet. Remember, men are the cause of or partially responsible for approximately 50% of all cases of infertility. A history of fathering children does not mean a man can not now be infertile. Male fertility declines due to age, environmental exposure, and other physiological changes. We, unfortunately, have many couples who failed to have a semen analysis done at a previous clinic or waive a semen analysis at ours, spend thousands of dollars and endure years of heartache, only to finally do a semen analysis and realize they have male infertility issues.
After your initial consult, medications will be prescribed for you typically within 7-14 days to whichever the least expensive self-pay fertility pharmacy is at the time. These medications can be reviewed in your patient portal. Because New York State prohibits the release of paper prescriptions, should you elect to fill any of these medications elsewhere, we request that you call the pharmacy where they were initially ordered and request they be forwarded electronically to the pharmacy of your choice. This helps to reduce duplicate medication orders which cause confusion for you, CNY, and the respective pharmacies. You will need to ensure you receive all your medications prior to calling to notify us you have started your period.
This part of the process can be tricky but we are here to help! Should your results not be received, our office will work with you and your facility to obtain these results. Given the archaic nature of fax, even though your facility may have sent your results, it does not always mean they were in fact received which can be very stressful for you. Rest assured that we will work together with you to obtain these results the same day. In the rare event your results are not received same-day, we will ensure you have a plan until the results are received. The most effective way to get us your results is to have your monitoring facility email them to our secure email server at: globaltravel@cnyfertility.com.
Yes, you will need someone to accompany you to your procedure, be available to receive your post-procedure instructions, and see to it that you arrive back home or to your hotel safely.
There are two primary ways you can communicate with us! First, we have a Clinical Team that is staffed with highly qualified fertility nurses who are available to you Monday through Friday from 6:00AM to 8:00PM Eastern and Saturdays from 7:00AM to 2:00PM Eastern. If they are unable to answer your question, they will send a note over to the Travel Team to assist you! The other way you can get in touch for non-urgent matters is through the Patient Portal. Please be sure to select “Travel Team” as your recipient so that your message can be answered in a timely fashion.
Generally, you can expect 3-5 appointments for each cycle—one baseline visit and several monitoring visits though this may vary from cycle to cycle according to your individualized plan of care as well as your body’s response to the medications.
Similar to our providers, the Global Travel Nursing Team works as a team and our nurses are all highly qualified to assist you in your journey. Each time you have an appointment locally to you, you will be assigned a nurse who will be responsible for reviewing your results and advising you of your next steps. Due to nursing schedules, this may not be the same nurse throughout your cycle; however, rest assured that our team takes care to notate your chart in such a way that any nurse can assist you.
All our providers work as a team to manage your care. This gives you the benefit of having many fertility specialists looking over and reviewing your case. We will always take into consideration your preferred provider; however, you may find that you had your initial consultation with one provider, see another provider for your retrieval, and see yet another for your transfer. This is partially because our providers may be in a different office location on the day of your procedure or may be out of the office. Rest assured that all of our providers have been hand-selected to provide the highest level of care at every turn.
CNY requires donor sperm specimens to be in our lab (at the location that your retrieval or insemination will take place at) prior to starting your treatment cycle. You will want to ensure the sperm bank you have chosen is approved by New York State. Once you have chosen a bank and a donor, you will work with the bank to send the appropriate releases over to CNY so that the specimen can be shipped.
These forms can be uploaded to your patient portal or sent a number of different ways depending on if you are a local or travel client.
For Travel clients, the releases can also be faxed to 315-930-2096, or emailed to our team at globaltravel@cnyfertility.com.
For local clients, results can be faxed to:
– Syracuse: 315-469-6789
– Albany: 518-724-5757
– Rochester: 585-244-1296
– Buffalo: 716-636-1940
– Atlanta: 770-282-1332
Finding a monitoring center is easier than it might sound! We recommend you start with your local OB-GYN, local lab, local hospital, or local fertility center. You will want to let them know that you will be receiving fertility treatment from a non-local provider who will need frequent transvaginal ultrasounds to count and measure your follicles and to evaluate the thickness and pattern of your uterine lining. You will need to let them know that we will need same-day STAT results by 2:30PM Eastern Time. It can be helpful for you to identify a contact person at your local facility who understands the sacrifices you are making to undertake this treatment and who can be your ally in ensuring your results are sent to our office in a timely fashion.
In addition to these ultrasounds, you will also need frequent lab monitoring—baseline monitoring (at the beginning of your cycle) will include Estradiol, Progesterone, LH, FSH, TSH, and HCG and your in-cycle monitoring will include Estradiol, Progesterone, and LH. Receiving these ultrasound and lab results STAT enables our team to analyze your cycle progress and provide you with the appropriate next steps.
Once you have had your initial consultation with us, your consult provider will summarize your discussion and send it to the Travel Team Nurses for review. Shortly after your consult, you will want to check your Patient Portal where we will upload three packets of information:
- Global Travel Information Packet: please read this very carefully as it will answer the majority of your questions about the process and what to expect.
- Test Requisitions Packet: this packet will contain requisitions you may need throughout the process.
- Consents Packet: this entire packet must be read carefully and ALL pages signed and returned PRIOR to the start of your cycle.
Within 7-14 days of your provider consult, a nurse from our team will reach out via phone for a quick follow up to discuss your next steps including cycle logistics, medications, and recommended pre-testing. The nurse will indicate which of the orders from the Test Requisitions Packet need top be completed, will order your medications, and will answer any questions you may have on the process.
We have partnerships with hotels near all our facilities. For a list of available accommodations, head here and click on the location you will be going to.
Our Syracuse, Albany, Buffalo, and Colorado Springs offices perform all IVF retrievals/transfers and other major fertility procedures. To learn more about doing IVF, Tubal Reversals, Donor Egg IVF or other fertility treatments at CNY when you don’t live near one of our retrieval and transfer centers, check out our Traveling for Fertility Treatment page.
You can see a full list of our office locations here.
That said, over half of our patients come from states which have no CNY Fertility offices because of our high-quality care, pricing at just 1/3 the cost of the national average, and payment plans.
Most coming from outside the area only need to be near one of our offices for 2-7 days.
Yes! In fact, due to the incredible medical and personal care we give to each and every one of our clients coupled with the affordability of our treatments (which is less than 1/3 the national average) over 1/2 of our clients come from states in which we have no office.
How is all of this possible? Well, all of our out-of-town clients have one of two options.
- Travel to us and stay with us for the entirety of your treatment (usually a few weeks)
- Have a majority of your treatment (all of your monitoring) managed by us, but done through your local OB/GYN, hospital, radiologist, or fertility clinic. If you need help finding a facility to do the monitoring, check out our map of affiliated monitoring facilities.
If you, like a vast majority of our travel clients, choose option two, we have a dedicated travel team that will provide you with orders for local monitoring and will communicate all of your instructions throughout your cycle. You then only have to travel to us for your actual fertility procedures. For IUI, that is your insemination, for IVF that is your egg retrieval and embryo transfer, and for Donor egg IVF that’s only your transfer if your sperm is shipped to our office beforehand (otherwise the male partner would need to be present for the egg retrieval).
For each of these, we recommend you arrive the day before your procedure. If you are driving, you may leave later the day of your procedure (only if someone else is driving). If you are flying, we recommend you wait until the day after your procedure to return home.
All of our offices see patients that are doing IVF; however, all retrievals and transfers take place at our Syracuse, Albany, Buffalo, or Colorado Springs offices.
