UKD – University Fertility Center Dusseldorf (UniKid) – Reviews and Prices

Dr. Katrin Demirin is something very special. She always takes a lot of time, listens carefully and explains everything clearly. I feel in good hands with her. Your team is also very friendly, helpful and professional – thank you for the great work.

This post is meant only to rate its receptionist team. I appreciate that UniKid team hired one receptionist who can speak English fluently. However, the same staff was rude, careless, and interrupted the patient’s inquiry/suggestions multiple times without showing kindness or patience. This receptionist needs customer service training, especially in communicating with patients undergoing treatment. The basic need from patients’ side for a hospital receptionist is not necessarily language skills (AI could easily do it), but rather kindness, empathy, patience to at least allow the patients finish talking and addressing concerns, instead of acting as an emotionless messenger who recites rules repeatedly. I understand that asking for “smiling more” might be too much, but learning to be a good listener and empathise with patients are probably not challenging goals to achieve, especially when one’s role represents the image of the clinic and is the first person that patients see every time. And it took me multiple bad encounters with her to finally write this post.

Perhaps the UniKid administration should consider an updated recruiting criteria in selecting qualified receptionists who really support the patients. And of course, it’s also important for the long term to build digital infrastructures (i.e. detailed online information that explains procedures, potential free monthly seminar/info sessions for patients or online videos explaining how the clinic works) that could facilitate effective communications about certain procedures to non-German native speaker patients.

Overall, I guess it’s not easy for any patients who go through the process and who visit the clinic regularly. In many cases, an open, transparent, yet welcoming, positive, encouraging, and hopeful speech would be much more appreciated by the patients (or at least, this is how I feel).

We started the process a little over a year ago. Today our 3 week old, completely healthy daughter is lying on my chest. The care is medically rational, but if successful, warm. I will never forget the appointment for the first heartbeat, which was also due to the doctor who accompanied me.

The process until then is generally not easy, not even emotionally – especially if it is not (immediately) successful. At Unikid, we wanted more sensitivity in the unsuccessful phase. People are looking for explanations, even if they may not be easily determinable medically, the need is still very great. An offer of emotional support should be expanded – not just externally, but also on site.

I wasn’t treated there but I had a nice chat with the department and they helped me a lot.
Thank you 5 stars

Very competent team! Thank you dear Unikid team, we have now become parents. We would particularly like to thank Dr. Thank you to Julia Bugler. Ms. Dr. Bugler calculated everything exactly and supported us very professionally with the ICSI. So everything worked in a very short time and after the first attempt.
Communication with Unikid was great for me, praise to the reception: I always received a call back after my email.

As part of our fertility treatment, we turned to UniKid. It was important to us to have the best medical and scientifically based care. For this reason we decided on a university clinic rather than a private doctor’s office. Gynecologist friends congratulated us on this step, as the UniKid is said to have an above-average success rate.

Yes – it is not always possible to reach us by phone (emails were ALWAYS replied to within a few hours)

Yes – the doctors rotate and you get to know different contacts.

But for us this was of secondary importance. Almost all of the nurses and doctors were professional, friendly and looked after us well. In particular, the tight, daily timing of the treatment worked without any problems. Prescriptions and treatment plans were always provided quickly and at short notice.

Conclusion: We wanted to have our treatment carried out in a university clinic and therefore in a clinic with an above-average probability of success. The negative reviews on the subject of a lack of empathy and organization initially unsettled us – but we cannot confirm them (we were encouraged and looked for a way forward even in the event of unsuccessful attempts).

We are happy about our pregnancy and keep our fingers crossed for all couples on this journey.

Preface
An unfulfilled desire to have children is an emotional issue. Once you start wanting children, it seems like everyone around you gets pregnant with ease. You see strollers everywhere on the streets, and while you’re happy for others, you ask yourself: Why not us too?

Some couples have medical reasons for not getting pregnant, others are actually able to conceive naturally and yet the wish remains unfulfilled. Before the treatment, it was clear to us that medicine can only help to a limited extent; anything beyond that remains a small miracle. There is no guarantee that your wish to have children will come true. Despite good conditions, we didn’t get pregnant for years, which is why we decided to have an initial consultation with UniKid.

UniKid – initial consultation
We pointed out from the start that we were self-payers and asked for comprehensive information about all possible examinations. The process was explained to us, including doctor rotations and options such as (hyper)stimulation, punctures, IVF and ICSI. We agreed and started treatment with UniKid.

UniKid – treatments
In the beginning everything was new, unfamiliar and uncertain. We quickly discovered how many couples, including very young ones, who want to have children are being treated. We also often saw tears. We never had a really good feeling there. We experienced an emotional roller coaster ride over several stimulation cycles for egg retrieval. From an unexpectedly large number of good eggs to no eggs at all, the process was always psychologically stressful. In addition to the emotional sensitivity of the topic, there was also the pressure of expectations that you perhaps unconsciously impose on yourself. I would have liked this emotionality and vulnerability to have been treated more sensitively, but unfortunately that was rarely the case. We were treated according to formula without any individuality.

The puncture to retrieve eggs takes place under general anesthesia. It is a small procedure that each patient has a different level of respect for. Some of the experiences my wife had to make were all the more incomprehensible to me: patients were rudely asked to go to the toilet again or ordered in a harsh tone, which was completely inappropriate for the sensitive situation. (Attention: This is our subjective perception of the situations that we or my wife experienced there!) Unfortunately, positive moments remained the rare exception during our treatment period from March 2022 to July 2023. Ultimately, what felt like an assembly line process without individuality and empathy led us to stop treatment at UniKid and put our trust in another clinic.

Change of clinic
Here, too, we gave the same information at the beginning: We are self-payers and would like to be informed about all the options so that we can decide for ourselves what we should and should not spend our money on. Here we were told about studies whose existence was never mentioned at UniKid. The entire process was very individual and appropriate to the sensitivity of the topic. For the first time, we really felt advised, were able to weigh up options and make decisions – accompanied by an empathetic team and two well-coordinated doctors.

Result
As said in the foreword: There is no guarantee of success! Medical support can help to better understand and optimize the process to increase the chances.
Additional investigations revealed a genetic constellation (KIR genes) that may prevent pregnancy. We would be lying if we said we were hopeful until the end. But in the end, literally the last egg cell, in combination with drug suppression of the immune system (due to the KIR genes), took its chance and led to a healthy pregnancy, which has now progressed into the 6th month.

Never lose hope!

I’ll keep it short:

– waited a whole three months for an appointment with a certain doctor and the appointment still took place with another one (online) and 45 minutes later
– Despite submitting numerous findings and documents, we noticed that the doctor hardly looked at them at all
had information about our case
– Making appointments via email (it doesn’t work over the phone at all) takes far too long and is definitely counterproductive for such therapy

We decided to stop the therapy there and not continue it. I hope that the reviews can make a difference so that many couples are spared such disappointment.

Organization and administration is a disaster. Appointments are simply passed on to other doctors without informing or asking. Complaints are ignored. Unfortunately I can only report negative things here and we therefore decided against treatment in this clinic.

In this way I would like to share my absolutely positive experiences with Unikid and encourage all couples who are looking for good, reliable, competent and emphatic fertility treatment.
We were treated there for the first time four years ago and have had a healthy child for three years. Now we are there for the second time and are again very satisfied with the treatment. All employees, from registration, blood collection, the laboratory to the doctors, are always friendly and very empathetic as well as absolutely competent. Sufficient time was always taken during consultations with the doctor, everything was explained in detail and people were always responded to very emphatically. I can only recommend it to all couples without reservation.