What is an Infertility Clinic?

An infertility clinic is a medical office that assists men and women who have difficulty becoming pregnant. These clinics are often involved in counseling, research, and treatment options. Such offices may also be known as fertility clinics.

This type of medical practice may be found in any country around the world. A doctor working at an infertility clinic is usually known as an infertility specialist. This type of physician differs from a gynecologist or general doctor of internal medicine in that he or she specializes in the reproductive cycles of both men and women, and can typically advise both partners on available options for treatment.

Treatments for infertility offered in such clinics can vary widely. They can include hormone therapy, in vitro fertilization, and surgical reversals, among others. Couples who have not used birth control for two years and have not become pregnant, and women with a history of multiple miscarriages are candidates for seeking the services of an infertility clinic.

Hormone therapy offers women a non-invasive option for addressing infertility. Hormones may be administered through injection or pills, and can target different time periods in a woman's menstrual cycle. The goal of this therapy is to chemically modify a woman's body, so that it presents the ideal circumstances for conception. These chemicals, or synthetic hormone medications, can often stimulate ovulation and thicken the uterine lining to prepare it for implantation. Hormone therapy may be used in conjunction with in vitro fertilization.

In vitro fertilization is a process in which several sperm are placed in a Petri dish with an egg, in order to fertilize it. The embryo is then implanted directly into the woman's uterus. This is a common procedure for women who wish to become pregnant but have problems with their fallopian tubes. In vitro fertilization can be very expensive, exceeding several thousand US Dollars (USD) for each cycle of implantation. For this reason, many women have multiple embryos implanted with each cycle to increase the likelihood of becoming pregnant.

An infertility clinic may also offer procedural reversals for individuals who have had surgery to become sterile. These surgeries often include vasectomies for men and tubal ligations for women. Since a vasectomy is an operation in which the vas deferens — the part of the male body that transports sperm — is surgically cut or blocked, vasectomy reversal, also called a vasovasostomy, reconnects the two ends of the vas deferens.

A woman who has had a tubal ligation is sometimes said to have 'had her tubes tied.' During this procedure, the fallopian tubes — which carry the egg down to the uterus for fertilization — are severed and pinched shut. Tubal ligation is not 100% reversible, though an infertility clinic will typically be able to judge the likelihood of the success of this surgery on a case-by-case basis.

Couples that are having difficulty becoming pregnant may wish to seek the advice of their general practitioner before visiting an infertility clinic. Seeking treatment for this problem can become very expensive and put an emotional strain on the parties involved. It can also require multiple tests, which can be physically painful, to determine the cause of the reproductive issues.