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Fertility Drugs
What You Should Know About Medications That Could Help You Conceive
By Michele St. Martin
Although one of the medications Kelli used, Follistim, is commonly given subcutaneously (with a needle just below the skin), because Kelli is overweight, she and her doctor decided that the drug would be absorbed better into her system if she took the shots intramuscularly. "I remember the shock after a few days of injections, as my stomach looked like a battle zone," she says. "It was purple and black and green from the needles. It hurt to the touch."
Somewhere between 20 and 60 percent of the women who use injectible medications will become pregnant while using them. Variables are many, including the type of ART and infertility factors.
Treatment starts within the first few days of a woman's menstrual cycle and continues anywhere from five to 12 days, depending on how long it takes a woman's egg follicles to mature. A woman using these drugs is monitored by her doctor through vaginal ultrasounds and blood tests to check estrogen levels at least every two to three days.
The dosage prescribed depends on a variety of factors, including the woman's age, body size and, if she has taken fertility medications previously, her response to them. The medications come in small glass vials called ampules (amps). The medication is powdered, and is mixed with a sterile diluent (liquid) and then injected into the woman. A woman can give herself subcutaneous injections (generally in the stomach, arms or hips), but a woman's husband or partner usually learns to give her intramuscular injections (often given in the buttocks or upper thighs).
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