Robbert and Daisy's Story (Feb 2016)

We ended up at Human First because we'd had 3 ICSI treatments in the Netherlands and weren't very happy with them. So we started searching online for ICSI treatment abroad. That's how we found the Human First website. The site gave us a lot of information about treatment in Istanbul. We then got in touch with Evren from Human First. She informed us really well about the options and the way things worked in Istanbul. That's why we decided to do the ICSI treatment in Istanbul. And so we started the process.

We very quickly got all the information we needed from Evren. Because we were already familiar with injecting hormones, we could choose a shortened trip of 10 days instead of 17 days. We decided to go for 10 days. Evren told us everything we needed to arrange in the Netherlands: blood test, ordering medication, arranging a visa, ultrasound. Once we'd picked the date, Evren arranged everything. We soon got an email with the flight tickets, the host's details, a form with a schedule of injection days, when we'd have the ultrasound and when we'd leave the Netherlands, and information about our first appointment at the hospital in Istanbul.

Once we arrived in Istanbul we were properly met by a hotel staff member. The next morning we were picked up at the hotel by the host. She picked us up and, together with a hotel staff member, came with us to the hospital. When we arrived at the hospital we could wait calmly in the waiting room, the host arranged everything. Once the host had checked us in, we could go see Dr. Cem. There, Dr. Cem told us properly in English how things would go over the coming days and what to expect. If we didn't understand something, the host translated everything very clearly and properly. Right away we got an ultrasound from Dr. Cem himself to check whether all the eggs looked good. We were told immediately that things looked good and that we could take the final trigger shot that same evening. We were also told right away that if the sperm wasn't good enough, they'd have an operating room ready on the same day as the retrieval to surgically extract sperm. Two days later we had to be at the hospital early again. First they checked whether the sperm was good. Half an hour later Dr. Cem told us the sperm was good enough. A little later I had the retrieval under full general anesthesia. The host was there every time a nurse came in, to translate everything properly. The host even came along into the operating room. Everything was explained step by step, what was being done. After about 15 minutes we were already out of the operating room and into the private room. After an hour, once I'd eaten something and could walk a lap around the bed, I was allowed to get dressed and go back to the hotel. I had to take it easy for 2 days. Because of the anesthesia I also slept a lot those days. I had absolutely no discomfort from this retrieval, whereas in the Netherlands I suffered a lot from it.

The day after the retrieval the host called us to say we had 5 fertilized embryos from the retrieval. And that 3 days later we'd hear whether the transfer would happen that day or after 5 days. After 3 days we got the call that 4 fertilized embryos remained and that Dr. Cem wanted to wait until day 5 to do the transfer. Which was a good sign, because then the embryos would be even stronger. On day 5 we were again properly brought to the hospital by the staff member. There we were met by the host. Once we were with Dr. Cem again, we were told that of those 4 embryos, 2 remained, one of which was of excellent quality. The second was slightly lower quality. Dr. Cem therefore wanted to transfer both. Then we got changed again for the operating room to have the transfer. The day after the transfer we flew back to the Netherlands and had to wait 2 weeks before we could take a pregnancy test.

After 2 tense weeks we could finally take the pregnancy test, and it turned out the treatment had worked: I was pregnant. After 3 treatments in the Netherlands with no effect, now pregnant right away with 1 treatment in Istanbul. We never expected that. By now we're 2 ultrasounds further and 11 weeks pregnant. We found this whole experience very pleasant. Everything was arranged perfectly, we didn't have to do a thing ourselves. We would recommend this trip to everyone.

Best wishes, Robbert and Daisy

Treatment in November/December 2015

This story was translated from Dutch by our team. Read the original Dutch version →