San Diego Fertility Center

11515 El Camino Real Suite 100 , San Diego- 92130
California ,

United States

+1-8587946363 https://www.sdfertility.com

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Mon - Fri 9:00 AM-5:00 PM

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San Diego Fertility Center - San Diego

San Diego Fertility Center® is renowned for being one of the most respected and successful infertility clinics in the United States as well as a leading fertility center in the Southern California region. SDFC is highly sought after for fertility tourism and fertility travel from around the world. Our doctors are fluent in English, Spanish, Korean and Mandarin Chinese, and translators can be provided in a variety of other languages. Visite nuestra nueva página Español! Nos proporcionan una variedad de opciones de tratamiento que incluye la donación de óvulos, subrogación gestacional y FIV.

Our fertility clinic locations are easily accessible from surrounding communities in Southern California including Orange County, San Bernardino, Riverside, La Jolla, Encinitas, Murrieta and Temecula. San Diego Fertility Center's long acclaimed egg donor program began as the first independent egg donation program in San Diego, California, providing egg donor IVF (in vitro fertilization) to couples for over a decade. Our fertility center's IVF Program (in vitro fertilization) is continually striving to implement new infertility technologies and fertility techniques in fertility care. San Diego fertility specialists, Dr. Hummel and Dr. Kettel, have been involved in pioneering studies of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) during IVF that can help recognize genetic disorders before embryos are transferred.

At San Diego Fertility Center, blastocyst transfer is available to all couples in our IVF program. Egg donor IVF combined with our successful blastocyst transfer program shows pregnancy success rates in egg donor IVF reaching the 70-80% per cycle range. San Diego Fertility Center has also led the way in the treatment of male fertility care, including intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI), and testicular sperm retrieval (TESE).

Dr. Hummel and Dr. Kettel have led the San Diego Fertility Center to success rates exceeding the national average. Woodward/White, Inc has voted both “Best Doctors in America” since 1997 (www.bestdoctors.com). The San Diego County Medical Society nominated Drs. Hummel and Kettel “Best Doctors in San Diego” in 2002, 2003, and 2004 (published in San Diego Magazine Vol. 54, No. 11; Vol. 55, No. 12; and Vol. 56, No. 12). Together they pioneered egg donation IVF and had the first Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis (PGD) case in San Diego. They played an active role in developing blastocyst transfer as a breakthrough technology, lowering the risk of multiple births. Working within the principles of innovation, intelligence, and integrity, they provide you with the finest comprehensive, state of the art fertility care possible.

Dr. Jeffrey Rakoff is an affiliate physician of San Diego Fertility Center. He is renowned in the community for founding the first IVF program that successfully achieved a pregnancy in San Diego in the early 1980s. With over 30 years of medical experience, Dr. Rakoff has helped countless families to have 'little miracles'. Dr. Rakoff provides patients with comprehensive fertility evaluation and care, including fertility consultations, infertility surgery and in vitro fertilization.

Dr. Susanna Park is an award-winning clinical researcher and a highly successful fertility specialist. Dr. Park is fluent in English, Korean and Spanish due to her international upbringing and brings a unique female perspective to our physician team. Her specialties include in intrauterine insemination, in vitro fertilization, laparoscopic and hysteroscopic corrective surgeries, oocyte donation, and gestational surrogacy.

Dr. Sandy Chuan is the newest addition to our fertility care team. Dr. Chuan has extensive clinical research experience, having published a wide spectrum of articles and presented findings at national medical events. Dr. Chuan is fluent in both English and Mandarin Chinese, allowing her to care for patients in either language. She is a compassionate physician, dedicated to helping patients conceive.

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Additional Information

San Diego Fertility Center, provides an egg donor program and IVF treatment known throughout San Diego and Southern California for meeting the highest standards and criteria set forth by the American Society for Reproductive Medicine.

For donor egg IVF, an egg donor recipient may select an egg donor who is part of our in-house egg donor program by using our egg donor database or one from an egg donor agency. Additionally, the egg donor may be a sister, close friend, or relative of the recipient's. The egg donors from our in-house program must pass a vigorous egg donor application process. We have many diverse candidates available including Korean egg donors, Asian, Spanish, African-American, Caucasian and more.

Donor egg IVF successfully treats women who are carriers of genetic diseases, women who have had multiple failed cycles of IVF, women with impaired ovarian function, or healthy older women. This IVF treatment also heightens the chance of pregnancy for women whose attempts at IVF have revealed a poor response to fertility medications or whose eggs did not fertilize well or form viable embryos.

As part of the IVF egg donation program protocol, an egg donor injects fertility medication to stimulate her ovaries to produce multiple eggs. Hormone replacement is used to synchronize the recipient to the egg donor cycle. Just prior to ovulation, using standard IVF techniques, the eggs are retrieved from the egg donor's ovaries and fertilized with sperm from the recipient couple.

Our donor egg IVF program has consistently had one the top pregnancy success rates for IVF egg donation in the world.At San Diego Fertility Center we help patients from around the world achieve their dreams of having a baby. Patients from Australia, New Zealand, UK, Germany, France, Spain, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, China and Korea have sought our expertise in finding egg donors, and receiving treatments such as IVF, ICSI, PGD and more.

The physicians of San Diego Fertility Center have years of shared experience to help patients become parents through gestational surrogacy. We will help you evaluate the benefits of gestational surrogacy and provide you with information about cost, legal issues, and treatment protocols.

In traditional surrogacy, the surrogate is pregnant with her own biological child, but this child will be raised by others. In gestational surrogacy, the surrogate becomes pregnant via embryo transfer with a child that is not biologically her own. The surrogate mother may be called the gestational carrier.

Once a suitable surrogate has been identified, and the screening process is complete, the cycle can begin. Timing depends on the surrogate's menstrual cycle and any scheduling conflicts among the surrogate, intended parents, or professional staff.
Surrogacy Cycle Overview

Once a suitable surrogate has been chosen from the surrogacy agency of your choice and the screening process is complete, the cycle can be initiated. The timing of initiating the cycle depends on the menstrual cycle of the surrogate and any scheduling conflicts among the surrogate, intended parents, or professional staff.

The surrogate needs to prepare her uterus for implantation with natural estrogen and progesterone. Because each woman is a little different, the dose, duration, and method of administering these hormones may need to be individualized. This can be determined ahead of time by conducting an evaluation cycle. This is a "dry run" in which we duplicate each part of the cycle except the actual transfer of embryos in order to determine how to maximize the chances of success. The evaluation cycle can be completed anytime before the actual procedure. In some circumstances, the evaluation cycle can be waived when the response of the uterus to hormonal stimulation is well known. This is fairly common for women who have undergone many treatment cycles in the past.

It is necessary to synchronize the menstrual cycles of the surrogate and the intended parent in order to obtain mature eggs and embryos and transfer these back into a perfectly prepared endometrium (uterine lining) to maximize the chances of pregnancy success. This is done using a variety of hormonal manipulations including birth control pills, leuprolide (Lupron), or Synarel. We will determine which technique will work best for each circumstance. Once both women’s (surrogate and intended parent) ovarian function is suppressed and their cycles synchronized, they can begin the process of preparing for pregnancy.

On about the same day, the surrogate and intended parent will begin hormonal therapies to prepare the appropriate target for pregnancy success. The surrogate will begin taking estrogen to stimulate endometrial (uterine lining) growth and the intended parent will begin taking FSH to stimulate egg production. These treatments are monitored with ultrasound and blood estrogen levels until the eggs are ready to be retrieved and the uterus is ready to accept an embryo. Usually these treatments will take approximately two to three weeks and require five office visits for ultrasounds and blood tests.

When the ultrasound monitoring of the ovaries and uterus determines that the eggs are mature and ready to be retrieved and the endometrial lining is appropriately grown, the intended parent is scheduled for egg retrieval. On the day of the egg retrieval the intended parent undergoes a vaginal, ultrasound-guided procedure under light anesthetic at SDFC. The ultrasound used for egg retrieval is just like the one used to monitor the process of the cycle in the office. When the follicle that contains the eggs is seen with the ultrasound, a needle can be directed through the top of the vagina into the follicle and the follicular fluid and eggs are aspirated into a test tube. An embryologist works with the physician in the operating room to examine the fluid under a microscope and find the eggs. On the same day as the egg retrieval, the husband provides a fresh sperm sample and the surrogate begins progesterone treatment.

Once the eggs are retrieved, they are taken to the IVF laboratory and placed with sperm in the incubator. The following morning it is determined how many of the eggs have successfully fertilized into embryos.The embryos are allowed to grow in the lab for several days to make sure they are healthy and dividing properly. Nature tells us that not all human embryos are perfect and by allowing them to grow in the laboratory incubator, we can see which embryos are healthiest and most likely to result in a successful pregnancy.

We usually allow the embryos to grow in the laboratory for somewhere between three and five days and then select a few of the best embryos for transfer into the surrogate uterus. The number of embryos placed in the uterus can greatly influence the success of the cycle, but also can increase the chance of multiple births. The determination of how many embryos to transfer is made carefully and only after we have all the information available about embryo quality, quantity, etc. This means waiting until the day of the transfer to make our final decision about the number of embryos to place into the uterus. Typically, we will recommend transferring two to three embryos into the uterus.

The actual embryo transfer procedure is a gentle, painless process. A soft tube (outer catheter) is inserted by the physician to a pre-determined position in the uterus. A smaller tube (inner catheter) is then loaded with the embryos and guided into the uterus through the outer catheter. The embryos are then injected into the uterine cavity and the catheter set removed. The embryologist inspects the catheters for retained embryos once the procedure is completed. The surrogate is then instructed to remain at home in bed for the next three days and continue her estrogen and progesterone treatments. A pregnancy test about two weeks (16 days) after egg retrieval will determine if the cycle is successful.

In successful cycles, the hormonal supplements are continued through the first trimester (12 weeks) of the pregnancy. Once the first trimester is completed and the placenta has matured to the point where it can provide for all the hormonal needs of the pregnancy, no further supplements are required. We will monitor blood levels of estrogen and progesterone at the end of the first trimester and taper off the hormone supplements gradually. Once the hormone supplements are stopped, the rest of the pregnancy is indistinguishable from any other pregnancy!

Specialities

San Diego Fertility Center (SDFC) is committed to creating miracles every single day!Core values of integrity, intelligence and innovation serve as our center’s foundation. Regardless of your circumstance, our nationally recognized infertility specialists work closely with you to develop a personalized treatment plan including: In-Vitro Fertilization (IVF), Egg Donation, Surrogacy, Pre-Genetic Implantation Diagnosis (PGD) and other protocol options.

SDFC celebrates individuals’ needs and desires. Treatment cycles are coordinated around a patient’s requests. Unlike some fertility practices, SDFC does not “batch” or group treatment cycles for the convenience of the center but rather, personalized treatment protocols are developed between the physicians and the patient.

Patients benefit from the expertise, compassion and insight contributed by each and every one of SDFC’s team. Daily Patient Care meetings are conducted that involve our physicians, their nurse practitioners, embryologists, and clinical staff. Every protocol plan is reviewed by our team during the duration of treatment. This approach provides our patients with a well-coordinated, well-executed, holistic experience…and some of the best success rates worldwide.

San Diego Fertility Center operates independently. We are unique in our not being affiliated with a larger institution so our patient care and attention is unprecedented. Yet, we maintain the capacity to provide our patients with cutting edge technology and medical advancements. By working independently, SDFC is dynamic in our ability to make changes, upgrade equipment, and creative financial plans. At the same time, we court nationally supported, clinical research and maintain top-notch credentials.

San Diego Fertility Center provides our patients everything one should demand of their practice: quality practitioners that develop a unique treatment approach, designed around our patients’ needs, with the best opportunity to fulfill their dream!