Do’s and don’ts of infertility visits

  In order to save treatment time, improve treatment efficiency and reduce treatment costs, infertility patients should be aware of the following precautions before diagnosis and treatment, so that your diagnosis and treatment can achieve the best results.  1. No matter it is the first consultation or the follow-up consultation, you should bring all the medical records of yourself and your spouse with you every time you go to the hospital, so that the doctor can understand your condition. In outpatient clinics, we often encounter patients who do not bring their original medical records and are unable to explain themselves, which affects the doctor’s diagnosis and treatment. Please fill in your name, gender, age, place of origin, address (down to the door number) and drug allergy history on the chart at the first visit, either by yourself or with the help of the medical staff. If you wish, please leave your phone number at the initial consultation so that the doctor can follow up and contact you.  2. For infertility patients, it is very necessary for the couple to be investigated and treated together. In some cases, infertility is the result of a combination of factors in both men and women, so the same investigation and treatment for both men and women will help to find the main cause, seize the main contradiction, solve the main problem and save the treatment time and cost. Some infertility patients, especially those from rural areas, suffer from infertility and mistakenly believe that it is only related to the female partner and has nothing to do with the male partner; other male comrades, arbitrarily believe that infertility has nothing to do with them and only let the female partner go to the hospital for examination.  3. Female patients must remember the specific date of menstruation. The day of menstruation when you see blood (regardless of the amount of bleeding) is the first day of the menstrual cycle, the second day is the second day of the menstrual cycle, and so on. Please try to remember and provide the Gregorian date rather than the lunar date. Some female patients misinterpret the first day of their menstrual cycle as the first day of clean menstruation, and many of them can no longer remember which day their last menstruation came when they visit the clinic, which often affects effective diagnosis and treatment.  4, female reproductive endocrine hormone test blood sampling time is generally in the 3rd day – 5th day of the menstrual cycle (special circumstances exception), pay attention to the morning fasting, 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. time period, emotional and physical state of calm blood collection. Therefore, after arriving at the hospital and paying the fee, you must rest for 10-20 minutes to allow your mood and body to calm down before proceeding. There is no cycle selection for men, other requirements are the same as for women.  5. Tubal lavage and angiography: performed within 3-7 days after menstruation, sex is forbidden after menstruation, bathing and sex are forbidden within two weeks after lavage or angiography. Moreover, it is better not to come on weekends (Saturdays and Sundays) for imaging, as imaging is usually not done on weekends. We often encounter rural patients who want to have their imaging done, but they are not in their menstrual cycle (more than 7 days after menstruation), or they arrive at the weekend, so they have to wait until Monday to have their imaging done.  6. Ultrasound monitoring of follicle development and ovulation usually starts on day 10-12 of the menstrual cycle and is monitored every other day, every day or every half day until ovulation. The specimen of urine test for predicting ovulation before ovulation should be taken from the first discharge of urine in the early morning and brought to the hospital in a clean container for examination.  7. Patients with female infertility should not rely too much on tubal lavage. It is recommended to perform imaging in due course to clarify whether there are tubal factors causing infertility. Some patients with infertility encountered in the clinic have undergone a lot of fluids, saying “the tubes are open”, but after the imaging, it is found that the tubes are actually waterlogged and not open.  8, male semen examination before abstaining from intercourse (including dreaming) for 2 to 7 days (preferably 3-5 days, if more than 7 days, please abstain from sex for 3-5 days after semen emission), if it is difficult to keep the specimen in the hospital, you can get a special sampling cup to keep at home (for examination only), the specimen must be intact and not lost, after keeping the specimen, specify the time to keep it, specifically to the minute, after keeping it, store the sampling cup in your inner pocket and send it to the laboratory within 30 minutes. The specimen will be delivered to the laboratory within 30 minutes.  9. Early pregnancy is diagnosed at about 1 week after menopause (i.e., 1 week after the expected date of menstruation) by performing a urine pregnancy test at the hospital or on your own. If it is positive, you are likely to be pregnant. Please inform your doctor promptly so that you can be provided with measures to protect your pregnancy and knowledge of pregnancy care.  Lastly, I would like to warn you that the infertility medical market is mixed, so please be careful not to believe in free examinations and advertisements, but to go to a regular hospital, or visit several regular hospitals, and then choose the best hospital for treatment.