I started menopur & follistim last night and I'm definitely screwing up the menopur. My RE said to use 1cc saline, but after mixing, I ended up with about 10% less. What did I do wrong? It wasn't easy to get the Q caps off and I wonder if some leaked out when I did. Also, when I injected myself, some leaked out onto my skin. Did I go to fast? I feel like I completely screwed up and gave myself much less medicine than I was supposed to. HELP!
I am on the same meds as you. I will say up front I have not had the exact same issues as you, but try not to worry too much. I am not using Q caps for some reason. Also, I was given some diluent in 1ml bottles, and all the rest are 2ml bottles, even though we are only using 75 of Menopur. It was driving me crazy that things did not seem like they were happening the way I expected.
Can you call your pharmacy? I believe many of them have customer service numbers you can call for advice. We thought we were messing up with the Follistim. I was convinced I was doing it all wrong, and would get no follies to grow. Instead, we are having a good response. Also, I used Cetrotide (like Ganirelix) for the 2nd time last night. The first night, the syringe was very hard to manipulate, and when we tried to get an air bubble out, we pushed slowly, slowly, then all of the sudden the syringe moved a lot, and some squirted out. I was panicked - but I asked the nurse about it yesterday, and she said it was fine and had barely any reaction when I told her. I was worried I did not get enough of the medication. Then last night, a bit leaked out when I did it.
You probably did fine, even though it might feel like there were mistakes. Hope you can call and ask your pharmacy to be sure. Best of luck to you.
Thanks for responding. Unfortunately, my pharmacy is not helpful. I called them when I had a question about refridgeration, got transferred 5 times, and was told to speak with my doctor if I have any questions. I am definitely not calling my RE on Saturday for this, but will see them tomorrow for blood/sono. Just want to try to get it right tonight. Thanks for the support. I'm not exactly panicking, but do want to avoid screwing up again.
I hear you. Good luck. Hope all goes well at your appointment tomorrow, and you can get some answers.
Here's the thing, what's done is done. You can't make yourself crazy over what you can't change, you can only do things differently today. Was there liquid left in the vial? If so, just inject the Menopur back into the vial and redraw into the syringe. Make sure you're injecting enough air into the initial vial of diluent as well. If you don't, you can't draw up all of the meds. When you're taking off the QCap, just do it slowly. Sometimes we get nervous mixing our meds, injecting ourselves, etc. The QCap is actually pretty easy to use, just twist slowly. As for the leakage, I've had that happen. Just make sure you leave the needle in for about 5 seconds after you've depressed the plunger all the way. That should help. You may very well have given yourself a bit less of the Menopur, I bet we've all done that, but surely not so much that you've derailed your cycle. Deep breaths.
I definitely injected enough air before pulling up the saline and there wasn't anything left in the vial after I mixed. In fact, because I had less than 1cc after mixing, I pushed it back in and redrew it...still less. Maybe my problem with the Qcap was that I didn't twist - I pulled. Thanks for the tip. As for leaving the needle in, I specifically ask the IVF nurse if I should do that (after watching some videos on youtube) and she said that it wasn't necessary and "there is absolutely no reason to do that". I still left it in about 2 seconds just in case. Could I be injecting too quickly?
Really...I'm not panicking. Just want to do it right. These meds are crazy expensive and don't want to need to buy more.
Huh. That's odd. I do try to inject slowly even though my natural inclination is to hit and run! I try to count to 3. Funny about the needle - I've been told specifically to give it a few seconds before withdrawing the needle. I hear you on not wasting meds. We had 2 syringes full of meds dropped on the kitchen floor last week. Luckily we squeaked by without needing more but I definitely freaked for a minute or ten.
I have to admit that I dropped a syringe of lupron on the floor, swabbed off the bent needle, injected it back into the vial, and prepared it again with a fresh needle. Hope that was OK to do...didn't want to waste it and figured that the medicine wasn't contaminated.
OK...so sounds like my nurse is just wrong. While I couldn't wait to pull it out, I'll leave it longer, inject slower, and make sure to twist the Q caps tonight. Thanks so much!!!
I asked my Dr AND nurse about that drop of med coming out after injection. Both said no big deal. I do the "hit and run" thing myself.
When we went in to learn how to do the shots, my IVF coordinator told us outright that even though we start with 1cc of water in the syringe, after we mix in the two vials of Menopur, there will be less than 1cc in the syringe. She was right--every time. Nothing bad happened, I made follies, they got mature eggs, etc. etc.
Have you considered switching pharmacies? I love my pharmacy so much. They have a nurse on call 24/7, and I've never been on hold more than three minutes. They are polite and helpful, and they even do follow up calls to make sure you're okay and to see if you have any questions.
Anyway, don't worry about the Menopur. There is actually supposed to be less in the vial after mixing.
I don't like the Q-caps either. It never fails that there is a bit of meds left in the vial. I liked using the regular needles to draw out the meds, but they didn't provide it to me with the menopur or bravelle, only the repronex I was on for my first cycles.
However, with that said, I am responding this time, where I didn't before, so I guess it really doesn't matter.
This cycle I was mixing 4 vials of Bravelle and 1 vial of Menopur to 1 cc of saline. By the time I was ready to inject I definately had less than 1 cc. I'm pretty sure this is normal though. My stimming went fine and was happy with ER.
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