Infertility Hormones

After doing all the blood tests, they finally decided that it's your hormones causing all the difficulties. With regards to sorting out infertility, hormones are always an alternative although there are some hazards linked with taking infertility hormones so make sure you do your reading.

You may not have to take actual hormones, but rather have medication to balance your hormones. These are for the ladies:

· Bromocriptine - Prolactin suppresses ovulation and promotes breastmilk production, so bromocriptine suppresses prolactin to stimulate ovulation. You may experience low blood pressure, nausea, headaches and maybe even dizziness as well.

· Clomiphene - Clomiphene encourages the pituitary gland to make FSH and LH which stimulate the ovaries to release egg cells. It is rather inexpensive and fairly effective, especially if you have PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome) or unpredictable periods, although you might experience insomnia, nausea, tender breasts and headaches while you're taking it.

· Metoformin - This is used to assist women with PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome) or insulin resistance as it reduces the amounts of male hormones in the body and thus helps the body to ovulate.

Actual hormones might also aid ovulation.

· Human Menopausal Gonadotropin (hMG) - These are administered if you have pituitary gland problems that don't respond to previous medication and contains FSH (follicle stimulating hormone) and LH (luteinizing hormone) obtained from the urine of postmenopausal women. HMGs are relatively costly and efficiency varies. The extra ultrasounds to ensure that the drug is doing its job will also increase the expense. Your odds of miscarriage or enlarged ovaries are bigger, as are your odds of premature or multiple births which have complications of their own.

· Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (hCG) - These work together with hMGs to promote ovulation and can also treat endometriosis although potential side effects include cysts on the ovaries, increased chance of multiple births and enlarged ovaries.

· Urofollitropin (FSH) - This could help stimulate the ovaries to ovulate and is usually given to women suffering from PCOS if clomiphene is not effective.

· Luteinizing Hormone - Releasing Hormone (LH-RH) - These drugs may be prescribed to treat endometriosis or to control the pituitary gland. It is quite tricky to administer and it increases your chance of multiple births and infections.

· Gonadotropin-releasing hormone (Gn-RH) - Also stimulates the body to release eggs by stimulating the pituitary gland.

· Progesterone - Helps development of a healthy endometrium lining to receive the zygote.

For the guys:

Infertility hormones don't work for guys as well as they do for the ladies, but they can be effective in certain situations. Below are some of the hormones that might be given to men, and it is interesting to see that many of them are a lot like those administered to women.

· Testosterone - Imitates natural testosterone to aid efficient reproductive function.

· Gn-RH - Gn-RH encourages the release of FSH by the pituitary gland which in turn tells the testes to manufacture sperm and LH which encourages the manufacture of testosterone.

· Bromocriptine - Men can also have an excess of prolactin and this will inhibit testosterone from being manufactured and cause sperm to be malformed. This could be treated with bromocriptine, be sure to check out the risks first! Hallucinations are not fun...

· hCG & FSH - Stimulates healthy sperm development. These are of the most effectual infertility hormones that can be prescribed for men.

Possible dangers:

Know what to anticipate from the medication you are taking to avoid any undesirable interactions. Another problem with infertility hormones is the increased risk of multiple pregnancies. That might not seem like such a negative thing to you when you're desperate to conceive. Having multiples entails far more complications than single pregnancies including an elevated chance of premature birth and the complications that follow.

Hopefully this has given you some help in deciding whether you would like to go for the infertility hormones or not. Best of luck to you!