Signs of Infertility – Knowing When it’s Time to Look for Help

Infertility can be a problem for any men or women regardless of age, or heritage. There can be many causes to bring on infertility. If you have been thinking of starting a family, but have been a little dismayed at the length of time it is taking to get pregnant, here are a few signs to look for to determine if you may be experiencing infertility.

Infertility is more common than was once thought. With over 6 million women in the United States alone having difficulty getting pregnant, more people are starting to take notice and investigate into ways of resolving the issue.

There are many contributing factors to why women can become infertile: women who are older who smoke, drink too much alcohol, are stressed out, have a poor diet, are into rigorous athletic training, are either overweight or underweight, have or have had a sexually transmitted infection, or diseases such as primary ovarian insufficiency or poly cystic ovarian syndrome.

If you have any concerns about whether you could be suffering from infertility, you are advised to keep trying to get pregnant for approximately a year, If you find you are still not having any success and you feel there could be a problem, you will want to schedule an appointment with your doctor to run some tests.

If you have been on birth control methods such as Depo Provara, these can often take up to a year or longer to get pregnant depending on your length of use. If you have been maintaining a healthy diet, getting regular exercise, and do not suffer from any illness or chemical deficiency, you body should be able to produce eggs for fertilization.

Possible Infertility Signs

If you have stopped having periods every month, this may be one sign that you are having infertility issues. This could be due to of the ovaries, issues in the central nervous system or pituitary gland, malformed reproduction organs, hormonal imbalance due to poly cystic ovarian syndrome, or too little body fat.

If you have had a miscarriage or more. Some women do not even realize they have been pregnant
until a miscarriage occurs. Infertility can also affect the ability to stay pregnant for some women. If you find you have had more than one miscarriage, you may want to discuss your situation with your doctor. With modern technology these days, the doctor may be able to provide you with a solution so you will stay pregnant.

One reason why it is extremely important to visit your doctor for a physical is if you are suffering from conditions such as Endometriosis, Pelvic Inflammatory disease, Stenosis, or Fibroids, these can all be medical intervention such as surgery or medication.

If you are concerned you may be suffering from infertility, contact your doctor for a complete examination. Unless it is not medically sound for you, most often infertility can be helped by surgery for repairing reproductive organs or drug treatment methods to promote ovulation.


PCOS and Infertility

Polycystic ovarian syndrome, or PCOS, it is a common cause of infertility in women. Up to 15% of women who are of childbearing age can have PCOS and infertility. It’s caused by hormonal imbalance, and women with PCOS normally don’t have regular menstrual cycles. Of course, “normal” varies between women, but in general, women ovulate approximately 2 weeks before a menstrual cycle would begin. This doesn’t happen with any regularity when one has PCOS.

How is PCOS diagnosed?

Two of the three following criteria normally must be met to be diagnosed with PCOS:

  • Menstrual cycles are abnormal
  • Ovarian ultrasounds display many small follicles
  • Elevated levels of male hormones are present, as determined by blood testing and/or examination

Other common characteristics of PCOS include obesity, skin tags, or something called acanthosis nigricans, which is characterized by velvety, dark patches on the neck or inner thighs.

Treating PCOS

If you have been diagnosed with PCOS and infertility, the first thing you should do is make a visit to your family practitioner. If you are overweight or obese, losing weight through a low carbohydrate diet and exercise program may be all you need to get pregnant. That’s because obesity makes you more resistant to insulin, and that as well as higher glucose levels are a major factor in PCOS and infertility.

If losing weight is not enough to mitigate the problem so that you can become pregnant, your doctor will probably refer you to a fertility specialist. One of the medications the fertility specialist may recommend is something called metformin. Metformin helps regulate your menstrual cycle, and has an additional benefit in that it helps suppress hunger as a side effect; in turn, this can help you lose weight. Dosages for metformin usually begin at 500 mg and are then increased up to what is usually a maximum of 1500 mg until a regular cycle begins.

If medications like metformin don’t help you become pregnant when you have PCOS and infertility, along with diet and exercise to reduce obesity, insulin resistance, and other pregnancy-limiting factors, your doctor may prescribe Clomid for you. Clomid induces ovulation because it encourages release of follicle stimulating hormone, or FSH. This can help you get pregnant.

If Clomid does not help you get pregnant, other fertility medications may also help with follicle stimulation, egg release, and ovulation. The danger with using fertility medications that stimulate follicles, of course, is that you may overly stimulate your ovaries, which can lead to multiple pregnancies. In fact, this is a major reason it’s not altogether uncommon today for women to have multiple pregnancies, such as being pregnant with 3, 4, 5, 6, etc., babies at once. Of course, this is dangerous to both mother and children, so these and other fertility drugs must be prescribed at the lowest dose possible to ensure no more embryos implant than the mother can carry safely to term. Therefore, with PCOS and infertility, it is important to work with reputable, prudent fertility experts so that your pregnancy will be safe and healthy for both you and your baby or babies.


Infertility Statistics

Often couples who have trouble getting pregnant feel isolated. They long to have a baby of their own, especially when they see others with children. Even though statistics say otherwise, they feel like they are the only people in the world having this problem.

Currently there are about 7.3 million US women between age 15 and 44 who have problems conceiving. Of course, many of them don’t even know it until they attempt to start a family. Some got pregnant even though they had issues like polycystic ovarian syndrome but had not been diagnosed until after they had kids. (But usually this is not the case.)

A number of other couples have undergone fertility treatments. And when the fertile couples see the happy couples with their new babies, and they don’t even contemplate whether the parents had some sort of infertility treatment in order to conceive.

In 2002, the following percentages apply to women between ages 15 and 44:

  • 11.9% received infertility services
  • 6.1% received professional advice
  • 5.5% received medical help to prevent miscarriage
  • 4.8% underwent a fertility test
  • 3.8% have received population drugs
  • 1.1% received artificial insemination
  • 11.8% have impaired fecundity (have problems getting pregnant and carrying a baby to term)

As you probably know, likelihood of becoming pregnant decreases with the age of the woman because of the loss of their eggs. Of childless women who have received infertility service:

  • 15.2% between the ages of 35 and 39
  • 17.3% between the ages of 30 and 34
  • 2.9% between the ages of 15 and 29
  • The percentage of childless women who are infertile:
  • 27.4% between the age 40 and 44
  • 22.6%  between the age of 35 and 39
  • 16.9% between the age of 30 and 34
  • 11% between the age of 15 and 29

Still, just because there are problems getting pregnant doesn’t mean that it’s impossible.  In vitro fertilization (IVF) is a very effective fertility treatment. Here are the success rates:

  • up to age 31 — 38%
  • by age 39 — 22%
  • after age 43 — less than 10%

But the numbers for women who have used an egg donor are encouraging: while IVF success was less than 10% for a 40-year-old mother using her own eggs, those with an egg donor had a success rate of 45% that is an even better rate than women using their own eggs in their early 30s.


Infertility Insurance

Couples who discover they are infertile have several available options still available to help them fulfill their dreams of having a baby on their own. Often the big issue is money.

Many fertility treatments available to couples are expensive. Just one in vitro treatment can run over $10,000. And it will likely take more than one treatment to become pregnant. Some fertility medications can cost upwards of $1000 per month. Some reproductive technology procedures cost over $4000. So you can see why many couples can’t afford to finance fertility treatments on their own fortunately supplemental infertility insurance is an option to get what they need without going bankrupt. Your existing insurance company probably has such a policy. Insurance providers cover a range of fertility treatments for a monthly premium. Usually, these include diagnostic fertility test artificial insemination and other types of reproductive technology, possibly including laparoscopic surgery as a diagnostic procedure. Naturally, these plans tend to cover the most inexpensive treatment that will most likely work. And he will also only cover treatments for limited number of cycles, usually 3-5. Donor eggs and sperm are not normally covered.

Here are the three types of infertility insurance: standard health insurance requires you pay a monthly premium for specific fertility coverage. Refund programs have you pay up front for your fertility treatments. If the couple failed to conceive, 70-100% of their money is refunded. The third option is simple financing. You take out a loan to cover the procedures. If you don’t conceive, the loans don’t have to be paid back in full.
However, not every couple is insurable. While it areas from insurers to insurer, certain qualifications have to be met to get approved, and you are usually required to have an existing policy with the company. Other requirements sometimes enforced: unit may have to be younger than 40, have to have attempted to conceive for one to five years, or you may have to have a policy for a year before you can use it.

Certainly there are a lot of considerations, but getting infertility insurance is worth looking into. After all, when treatments are successful, the couple is certainly going to need funds to provide for their new bundle of joy. So you could say infertility insurance allows you to become pregnant without breaking the bank.


Understanding Acupuncture and Infertility

Acupuncture and infertility are commonly not thought of together because most people look towards surgical procedures and prescription medication as the common treatment for this condition. However, there have been many great strides over the years undertaken to reverse the problem of infertility.

Infertility refers to the inability to become pregnant even after 12 months of sexual intercourse without the employment of birth control in any way. Infertility can be a serious and anguishing problem for many. This problem can be further compounded by the invasive and sometimes frightening treatment procedures associated with common medical solutions to infertility.

Acupuncture and infertility are able to work well in concert with one another because acupuncture has the ability to deliver effective improvements in many medical conditions. This is achieved through acupuncture’s ability to alter the chi flow in the body’s meridians. As many are aware, this is achieved through the insertion of various needles into the acupuncture points of the body. This process is most certainly not a random one as expert care and skill is needed to properly impact the body in a manner that will yield the desired result.

Documents using as acupuncture being used to treat infertility dates back to the 12th century. (The actual use of acupuncture to treat infertility surely dates back many more centuries prior to the actual documentation) The process can employ various goals and methods. It can be employed to improve sperm function and regulate menstrual cycles. These could be considered singular approaches to dealing with the specific underlying problems associated with infertility.

However, there is also the potential to explore fully body acupuncture therapy which can impact various maladies one may be dealing with and improve their current condition. This method can eradicate problems associated with infertility as well as other similar wellness related problems.

Of course, in order to gain the most benefit out of an acupuncture session, it is important to procure the services of a qualified acupuncturist that understands what is needed to locate the cause of the problem and perform the process to alleviate the issue. This requires a knowledgeable and experienced hand that knows how to effectively employ acupuncture for a positive effect.  Also, it is important to realize that several sessions may be required in order to achieve the proper results. Even the most skilled of acupuncture professionals realizes that several sessions may be required to alter the underlying problems. This is not to say that it is impossible to achieve results in one session. In general, however, it is best to expect a few sessions will be required to deliver the expected results.  Eventually, a reversal of the problem may be achieved.

Acupuncture and infertility treatments have been linked for centuries. As such, you can rest assured a qualified acupuncturist can deliver previously elusive results.