Welcome to the University Hospital's Centre for Reproductive Medicine

Covid-19 Treatment Update 18/05/2020

We are pleased to be able to tell you that we are restarting fertility treatments after receiving final authorisation from the HFEA and UHCW NHS Trust.

Please note that patients who were stopped mid-treatment or about to commence treatment before we shut will be given priority.  This may result in a waiting list to commence treatment for new patients.

Priority may also be given for patients who have specific medical needs that need to be taken into account.

Covid-19 Safety Measure changes in CRM

New measures have been put into place to protect the safety of patients and staff and to minimise the risk of spreading the infection.

Social Distancing:

In line with the social distancing advice issued by the government, we have added precautionary measures to reduce the number of patients in the clinic at any one time.  Therefore, patients are asked not to attend the CRM wherever possible. 

• We will be conducting most of our patient appointments and consultations by virtual meetings or by telephone.
• However there will be situations where you will need to attend the clinic.  If you are required to come into the CRM you are advised to avoid public transport if possible.
• As we want to reduce the number of people in the CRM we would ask that patients must attend alone and their partner can wait outside of the CRM building.
• Specific appointment times will be given to patients.  Patients are required to arrive not more than 5 minutes earlier than their appointment time.  Patients will be asked to wait outside the building or wait in their cars until the appropriate time.
• We will be adhering to the social distancing within the CRM, and patients will be asked to sit at a distance from anyone outside their household.
• To ensure social distancing within the waiting areas, consultations and appointments times will be strictly adhered to.
• Our clinic layout has been changed to follow the principles of social distancing

Is it safe to resume treatment?:

At present there is limited experience of Covid-19 during pregnancy, however current information from the Royal College of Obstetrics and Gynaecology suggests that the severity of infection is no worse during pregnancy than in other healthy adults. At this stage, there is no evidence of an increased risk of miscarriage, fetal anomalies or adverse pregnancy complications. However, the risk to individual patients will vary depending on their clinical situation, risk profile, and the likely persistence of the virus within their local community. Please be aware that other pregnancy care policies may also be different during the Covid-19 crisis

It is your decision whether to proceed with treatment or not and a record will be made in your notes.

Patient triage and testing:

All patients wishing to commence treatment with CRM will need to complete a coronavirus screening questionnaire; this will be needed more than once during treatment.

Patients and partners will also need to complete a ‘Covid-19 Consent for Treatment’ form prior to commencing treatment.

To reduce the spread of coronavirus and the risk to patients and clinic staff, during certain treatments we will need you to undergo Covid-19 swab tests; these will happen twice during your IVF treatment.  We will only proceed with the treatment if the results are negative. 

Any patients testing positive will be need to self-isolate for 7 days and will be unable to continue with their treatment.  If your treatment is cancelled due to Covid-19 test results, the CRM clinical team will inform you of how to proceed once you are no longer Covid-19 positive.

Personal Protective Equipment (PPE):

All staff will be required to wear PPE to protect patients and other members of the CRM team

The UK government does not recommend the use of face masks for the public for medical appointments however patients may wear face masks if they wish to do so. CRM cannot provide face masks for patients.

Please bring your own pens to every appointment to fill in and sign consents and documents.

Counselling:

We understand that during these unpredictable times patients may require extra support and our counselling service remains available for you to access. 

Finally we would like to thank you for your patience during these exceptional times.  We will do our best to help you through your treatment and we wish you all the best of luck.

Recent figures show the excellent results we have continued to achieve at CRM Coventry. Some of those figures for IVF/ICSI treatment during 2019 can be seen here:

Our sincere thanks to all our patients who have, without exception, understood the reasons for us being unable to offer treatment, and for your support of our staff at this difficult time.  We understand how desperate many of you will be to start your investigations or re-start treatment and we hope to do this as soon as we are permitted. 

Finally we want to thank our hardworking CRM staff some of whom have been invaluable in the UHCW response to the Covid-19 pandemic by working in other wards in the hospital. Here are some photos of them at work.

24th March 2020

Dear Patients, 

Due to the ongoing situation regarding the Coronavirus outbreak we have taken the decision to stop all treatments taking place within the Centre for Reproductive Medicine (CRM) at UHCW. This is in accordance with organisations including the British Fertility Society (BFS) and the Association of Reproductive Scientists (ARCS) and follows the governmental advice issued to us by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA)

We have also stopped face-to-face clinic appointments and will try and re-arrange telephone appointments instead

We will reschedule all treatment cycles once we re-open

There will be members of the scientific team present in CRM so that all frozen samples will continue to be safely stored during our shut-down period

Please continue to check our website where we will provide updates as the situation changes

Further advice from the HFEA can be found here: https://www.hfea.gov.uk/about-us/news-and-press-releases/2020-news-and-press-releases/an-open-letter-to-fertility-patients-sally-cheshire-cbe-chair-hfea/

NB: Please note the only exception to this is male patients who are attending for sperm freezing prior to chemotherapy or other treatments that may affect their fertility. In these instances your medical team will still be able to refer you.

Please take all measures to keep yourselves safe and healthy during these difficult times and we look forward to seeing you again in the future.

CRM Management Team

_____________________________________________________________________________________

One of the leading fertility centres in the UK

We are one of country’s leading fertility centres incorporating a variety of cutting edge treatment options and world class research to maximise your chances of successful treatment.

The main risk from IVF treatment is having a multiple pregnancy. We are very proud that our multiple pregnancy rate is under 10% of all pregancies achieved whilst maintaining one of the highest clinical pregnancy rates in the UK.

In the latest statistics provided by the HFEA (our regulator), we are the number one rated NHS led IVF centre in the UK for pregnancy per embryo transferred in younger patients. This is achieved by the great amount of attention to detail from every member of our multi-disciplinary team throughout your treatment. Our close links to the Biomedical Research Unit in Reproductive Health at the University of Warwick (including the Tommy’s miscarriage centre), only further the level of care and treatment options we can provide here at Coventry CRM.
 

Services provided at the CRM:

Diagnostic andrology including post-vasectomy analysis 
Reproductive surgery (e.g. tubal and endometriosis)
HyCoSy tubal patency assessment
IVF (In-Vitro Fertilisation)
ICSI (IntraCytoplasmic Sperm Injection)
Egg Donation 
Intra Uterine Insemination
Ovulation Induction
Surgical Sperm Retrieval
Fertility preservation
Sperm, Egg and Embryo Storage

Find out more about the Centre, our team and the different treatments available.

Back