Intralipids

Yes had intralipids all the way up to 12 weeks pregnant! This is my 7th transfer and I’m now 22 weeks - previously had 3 early miscarriages. Not sure if it’s intralipids that work but I am glad we did it! I didn’t feel poorly afterwards just sore on my injection site and the entire arm for a while. Good luck!!

I truly believe intralipids are the thing that has changed our entire journey and got us to where we are now! I had 5 frozen transfers and 5 pregnancies, all ended in spontaneous miscarriages at around 6 weeks with genetically normal babies. I then tested my NK cells and found they were high, transfer 6 I had intralipids and we had a missed miscarriage at almost 9 weeks but our numbers and measurements had always been slightly off so our consultant believes there may have been a structural issue with baby although again their genetics were normal. Transfer number 7 and I’m currently just coming up for 11 weeks pregnant! We put all our our faith into our consultant with the intralipids and for us we believe it’s been our missing piece! X

Yes we have gone down this path too, after 2 missed miscarriages I was tested for NK cells and mine came back high. We did go on to have one failed transfer when on the immune protocol, but I’m currently 8 weeks pregnant following our latest transfer and I had intralipids pre-transfer, at positive test and have my next one coming up on Monday. Also on prednisolone and hydroxy for the NK cells. Good luck xxx

@Wanyu thank you! Congratulations- good luck to you too 😊

@Jade awe bless you congratulations and sticky baby dust! That’s really amazing and encouraging to hear! x

@Amy thank you, good luck to you too! I am also on steroids x

Hi everyone, could I ask what led you to going down this route / what you’d tried before? I’ve had two chemical pregnancies before IVF, and then two failed rounds (negative tests), then two rounds when I got a positive, which faded within a week, so suspect two more chemicals (the most recent FET was with a PGT-A tested euploid embryo). This round I was on loads of progesterone (4x cyclogest & 1x lubion) and blood thinners… I think NK test is next for me. But would be interested to know what you’d all tried before. I am sort of hoping my NK levels are high, so we have an explanation for the multiple chemicals.

@Jen we had our testing done after 5 miscarriages all from FETs, our embryos weren’t genetically tested but we had had 3 of the baby’s genetics done after we lost them and they all came back normal. All of our miscarriages happened spontaneously around 6 weeks and my gut instinct was that my body was rejecting the pregnancies. I’d had every blood test that existed done twice and we had our karyotype bloods done which were all normal. We’d tried a different protocol each time and nothing made a difference. We decided to go against our IVF clinics wishes and test for NK cells, along with having an EMMA and ALICE biopsy and a saline sonogram. The only thing that came back was my NK cells being elevated. I went on an extremely intense immune protocol and I’m now 13 weeks pregnant, for us we believe it was our miracle answer. The best advice I can give is follow your gut instinct xx

After 3 early miscarriages I had all the immunological blood tests done in Taiwan where I’m from and brought back the reports to my ivf clinic in the UK (Care Birmingham). They did not hesitate to prescribe intralipid & steroid post transfer until I was 12 weeks pregnant. I’m now almost 24 weeks and I also believe it made a difference!

When you got positive tests did you also have HCG done at the clinic? Mine have also been very low, so don’t know if my body is rejecting the pregnancy really early on (before it’s had a chance to progress) or if it’s something else? I suppose I will only know if I do the NK test. I don’t know what any of those other tests are @Jade - is it worth investigating them, or focusing on the NK cells? I’m at Care Birmingham too @Wanyu. They have mentioned the test previously actually, but suggested we did PGT-A first because of our ages (I’m 38 & my husband is 39), as they said it’s more likely to be a genetic issue, but this latest embryo was normal.

@Jen Definitely do more tests in that case - my NK was normal and super low actually, but there were some other red numbers that I don’t recall. We also did PGT and tested 2 embryos, both came back normal.

@Jen this website explains the biopsies I had quite well, I didn’t have the ERA because we knew my embryos were implanting well as my HCG was always good so the timing of our transfers wasn’t the issue. A saline sonogram is basically a transvaginal ultrasound while your uterus is filled with saline, it can show scar tissue, adhesions, polyps, fibroids, abnormalities etc, it’s a much cheaper and less invasive alternative than going straight for a hysteroscopy. We did all of these tests at the same time with our NK cells because I wasn’t prepared to risk anymore embryos on anything that could’ve been fixed relatively simply x

Hey @Jade - did you mean to post a link to a website? Hmm, I wonder if I need to request additional tests. I think we’ll be talking about an egg collection in January now, with the wait for NK test results, and then when my cycle is likely to fall compared to Christmas. Did the other tests take a long time / was there a long wait for results? x

@Jen oh yeah sorry! https://www.igenomix.co.uk/genetic-solutions/endometrio-clinics/#:~:text=The%20ERA%20test%20evaluates%20the,personalised%20embryo%20transfer%20(pET) The saline sonogram and biopsies have to be done at certain points in your cycle. I think we had ours done over a two week period, saline sonogram was in the first half of my cycle and the biopsies were in the second half of my cycle. I have very long irregular cycles where I don’t ovulate so I did a ‘medicated’ cycle just to make that work. We had a follow up appointment 2 weeks after the last test so it was about a month all in x

Thanks so much, I’m definitely going to ask my clinic about this!

Hi ladies, can I please ask where you got you NK cell testing done please? I’m wondering if this is a route I might need to go down also x

@Laura I went to Dr Shehata at the CRP clinic x

@Laura I went with Dr Tozer at Aria clinic x

Thank you! X

Hi, I’m just wondering how everyone coped with the really intense immune protocol that included steroids? So nervous about the extreme side effects that you can get from steroids, so I’ve decided to try heparin first because that’s supposed to slightly suppress the immune system. I have antinuclear antibodies which they’ve said could be attacking the embryo when transferred……anyone else been told the same? x

@Blonde Peanut for me personally I didn’t struggle too much with the steroids, I was on a very high dose for my last 4 transfers with the last being for 12 weeks in total. I had some trouble sleeping and put on a lot of water weight but other than that it wasn’t too bad, and if anything they completely stopped my morning sickness! I also only ever had a mild headache with all of my intralipid infusions. If I’m being totally honest the things I found the worst were the huge amount of progesterone I was on and the blood thinners, Clexane and aspirin. My entire abdomen was black and blue from bruising with the blood thinners and it was extremely painful for the full 12 weeks, I also had 6 episodes of bleeding which were made worse by the blood thinners too. These regimes do tend to just have to be a mind over matter kind of thing that you just have to find a way through unfortunately xx

@Jade thank you for replying, I’m kind of at a cross roads & undecided what treatment route to go down. It all gets too much with the amount of drugs we have to pump into us & the fact there’s no guarantee with either treatment. Getting tired of getting nowhere x

@Jade I also didn’t realise the blood thinners would have that kind of effect so it is good to know. Sounds awful though what you’ve had to endure x

@Blonde Peanut this absolutely may not be the case for everyone, it was just my experience. I do bruise extremely easily and I was taking 3 injections a day all in my abdomen for 12 weeks total. This was also my 7th round and when I counted up how many injections I’ve done in total across 3 years it was over 800 so I’ve obviously built up a lot of scar tissue! Xx

@Blonde Peanut I started my full immune protocol with round 6 (MMC) and then did the exact same thing for round 7 (currently 21 weeks), it was extremely intense and I did worry at times about the volume of medication I’d been pumped full of over the past 4 years but for me I can hand on heart say I’d do it again if I had to. My full medication list for this round was - aspirin, cyclogest, enoxaparin, ferrous sulphate, folic acid, intralipid infusions, levothyroxine, lubion, metformin, prednisolone and zumenon. Then a whole stack of probiotics and vitamins alongside it! It took us 4 years, 7 transfers and 6 miscarriages but I feel like I can finally say transfer 7 is our miracle take home baby ❤️

@Jade wow! That sounds mega intense, I can’t believe the list of everything you had to take. Just freaks me out, each time seems to equal more & more drugs. I only get mature eggs when I’m on the long protocols. 1st I had problems getting eggs n now I’m having problems getting them to stick. I just hope it’s not all for nothing, it’s worth it if it all works but I can’t imagine doing 7 rounds…..is that 7 egg collections as well? Xx

@Jade hey Jade when did you take the probiotics was it before your transfer? Can you share which ones you took and for how long please x

@Lucie I’ve taken them at different times and for different lengths of time from transfer 3 to transfer 7, I personally took Invivo Bio.Me Femme V on the recommendation of a nutritionist, after I had my EMMA and ALICE biopsies done my consultant sent me a long list of recommended probiotics which these weren’t on but I sent them over and she said they were absolutely fine and as my biopsies came back perfect by body obviously responded well to them. I think the longest I took them for was 6 months continuously, I then took them anytime I was on antibiotics and also did a months course at transfer I think x

@Jade thank you Jade I’m thinking of taking a probiotic before my next transfer. Are they capsules or powder? Did your Emma and Alice flag up anything before taking them? Did you use vaginal probiotics? I’ve used pessaries in the past a few weeks before transfer x

Hi everyone. Would anyone mind sharing their NK cells test results? I’ve been told mine were on the higher end of normal, but would like to know what sort of values others were getting when they were offered intralipids. Thanks!