Reproductive Immunology

Today a friend in the UK (whom I "met" via fertility message boards), posted a link to an article in a UK newspaper about a treatment she is starting. I wanted to pass this article along, because I plan to pursue immune testing as a possibility if we have to resort to IVF again.

Dr. Beer was a pioneer in the field of Reproductive Immunology and I talked a little about his book (Is your Body Baby Friendly?) in a previous post. His book is very new, actually published after I started my fertility journey. This was one of the first books on IVF that I found to provide real explanations for couples who continue to have infertility & IVF failures. (You should see all the post-it notes & highlighting in my copy). Most of the patients who go to Dr. Beer's facility (Dr Beer has passed away but the center he founded still provides these treatments) have usually already had 3 or more IVF failures or miscarriages. The article explains in fairly simple terms what the theories & treatments are to prevent another failure so I won't try to explain it myself. I hope to have the testing done before we make another IVF attempt (if IUI does not work within the next two tries, then we will have to move on to IVF again). Unfortunately, Dr. Beers ideas are not accepted by the entire medical community.. so I do not know how feasible it will be. But in my opinion, it would be better to have the tests done than keep trying if something is wrong. Even if all the tests come back all negative, at least you know that is not the cause of your failed attempts. One of the biggest frustrations with infertility is not knowing (at least for me anyway).

The woman in this article wrote about an 8 page introduction in Dr. Beer's book..
Daily Mail - My body tried to kill my baby

I also listed a few quotes from the book.

"Pregnancy risk assessment is advocated in many areas of medicine. We must now add 'immune risk assessment' to find the unfortunate people who end up spending a fortune in money, time and emotion, and get nothing in return. I strongly believe that we can identify these couples even before a first IVF failure."

"Unfortunately, if you mention these ideas to your doctor you must still be prepared for them to laugh at you and not take you seriously. Yet these same doctors would take autoimmunity seriously if it affected your thyroid gland, insulin-producing cells and joints. It's only infertility and recurrent losses that they consider have no biological causes outside of those that can be treated with fertility drugs."

"Studies have reported that many couples consider infertility to be at least as, or more stressful than divorce or the death of a loved one, with up to half of infertile women feeling depressed and anxious" (I've also heard it compared to the stress of dealing with cancer).

Is Your Body Baby-Friendly?

This week I received my Amazon order with several IVF books. I'll review them here as I read them. But I wanted to make a note on this book now.

Is Your Body Baby-Friendly? By Alan Beer

I was surprised at the size of this book. It is nearly 500 pages! Skimming through it, I found that nearly 1/2 of the book consists of notes. The notes provide supporting documentation for the many statements through the first half of the book. Most of us non-medical types will have no interest in referring back to that section. From the few other parts I've skimmed so far, I see that this is not going to be an easy read. Though many of the medical terms are explained as simply as possible, it is still rather in-depth and highly technical.

For any of my friends concerned about miscarriage or IVF failure, you can borrow this book. If I had skimmed the book at a bookstore/library, I would not have purchased one for myself.

infertility books

warning - long post
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I've started reading a lot on infertility though recently I've been focusing on the emotional/mental side. Intially most of my personal research was online (faster, easier, free!) though I've read a few books too. I'm pretty much through all the basics of fertility treatments, so I've skipped to the more in-depth IVF books. For anyone going through fertility issues or close to someone going through it.. I recommend the following books. I have also ordered a few others. I'll update later once I've read those. (These link to Amazon just b/c I copied the titles from there to speed up writing).

1 - Conquering Infertility: Dr. Alice Domar's Mind/Body Guide to Enhancing... By: Alice D. Domar, Alice Lesch Kelly
This one was recommended to me by my therapist. I started seeing her b/c infertility is one of her specialties and around last fall I started having a harder time dealing with my feelings about this process. She recommended this book in one of our first sessions. I skipped around a lot as I read this.. depending on where we were in our cycles. There are a lot of coping skills that are mind/body techniques (google mind body medicine if you want to learn more) plus it shares a lot of stories from other women. I suggest reading sections as they apply to you (I think it would be very stressful and upsetting to read the chapter "When Miracles Don't Happen:Coping when Treatment Fails" in the midst of treatment. But I flipped straight to that chapter the day after finding out our IVF cycle did not work). I also have found this book to be the kind of book that you want to reread, specifically if you are having trouble in certain areas. The chapter titles are very helpful in directing you to sections you need most. The day I got the book, I skipped ahead to 2 chapters.. first "Coping When Everyone But You Has a Baby" and then "Infertility and your Career". At that time, those were the two areas I was struggling with most. I definitely recommend this one regardless of where you are in your fertility struggles. It is not IVF specific.

2 - Nurturing Yourself Through IVF: Improve Your Experience, Maximize Your Odds of Success [Paperback] By: Lynn Daley (Author)
I found this one on Amazon as I searched for books that were more focused on IVF. Many of the other books I had found were too basic. IVF is one of the more advanced infertility treatments and as such, it can be more difficult to deal with both the physical & emotional aspects. I wasn't sure what to expect from this one but was pleased with it. Don't be disappointed when you see it, as I was initially, it is very short but worthwhile. Daley expands on (and references frequently) Domar's concepts from Conquering Infertility. Though this one does focus on IVF, I would say most of the advice can be used at any stage of infertility. I wish I'd found this one just before starting IVF instead of after one full cycle. In this case, the author is neither a doctor or psychologist, but just a regular person who went through IVF several times. She talks a lot about both her own experiences and those of other women she met along the way. Not everything in the book will apply to all people (I found I did not relate one iota to the section on superstition, but apparently some women do become superstitious during this process) but you should find that the majority of it is very helpful. She focuses on putting yourself first, 'editing your world' (such as avoiding baby showers if they make you uncomfortable), and the mind-body connection. This is again one that is good to read once, but more useful to reread & reference as needed. She also references lots of other resources along the way.

3 - Is Your Body Baby-Friendly?: Unexplained Infertility, Miscarriage & IVF Failure - Explained and Treated [Paperback] By: Alan E. Beer (Author)

I found out about this book from my online friends, specifically from the leader of a bulletin board that I frequent. [Sidebar: I've read lots of other message boards in the past but found they became an obsession, not only for me, but for the other women. When I was going through the last 3 or 4 rounds of Clomid, I joined a board focusing on Clomid. Though I thought having other women in the same boat to talk to would be helpful (and it usually is), this was not! These women posted to the board at least daily, but often more than that. During a Clomid cycle, you must take medicine for several days (for me it was days 3-7) and then you 'try' at home during a certain timeframe. Then you wait. And wait. If you are reading and posting daily, you will go crazy during a Clomid cycle. Though you can never truly forget about trying to conceive, I found during Clomid I had to distract myself. Reading & responding to those posts so frequently actually made me feel worse instead of better. Point of the story is that online message/bulletin boards are useful, but find one that is helpful for you, if you feel worse after visiting your board, then maybe you should move on.] Anyway, the leader of this board has had several (about 5 I think) failed IVF cycles and is a few years younger than me (this is not the norm with the women I meet.. usually they are older than me). She has reached a point where they cannot figure out why IVF will not work. She's going to a specialist in IVF failures now and one of his colleagues, Alan Beer, wrote this book and was founder of Alan E Beer Center of Reproductive Immunology and Genetics. She caught my attention when she mentioned a family history of Rheumatoid Arthritis as my DF was diagnosed with RA in his early forties. I've not received this one yet (should be here any day now) and I'm anxiously awaiting it. Beer focuses on the 5 types of immune system responses that can cause reproductive failure (including IVF failure & miscarriage). This link was also mentioned in "Nurturing Yourself Through IVF" (previous review). I'm hoping to get through this one before our next consult with the RE. At the very least, I will be asking him about this type of testing. I don't want to go another IVF cycle without at least testing for this immune problem in case it could help us with treatment.