The tests to have done before you travel for treatment

The most expensive mistake in cross-border fertility care is not choosing the wrong clinic. It is arriving with nothing in hand, and being told that before anything can start you need a month of tests — most of which you could have done at home, cheaply, without a flight.

A workup is not paperwork. It is what determines your protocol, your medication doses and what the clinic can realistically tell you about your odds. It also sets expectations: the Australian data presented at ESHRE in July, following 18,396 women, found 68.2% had a baby within three cycles using single embryo transfer. Three cycles. Planning for a process rather than a single event starts with knowing where you are standing.

What a clinic will normally want to see

Exact lists vary, and your clinic’s list beats this one. But most requests fall into the same categories.

Ovarian reserve. Usually anti-Müllerian hormone (AMH) from a blood sample, and an antral follicle count from an ultrasound early in the cycle. It is worth understanding what these do and do not measure: they predict roughly how many eggs a stimulation is likely to yield, which shapes the protocol and the dose. They are poor predictors of egg quality, and on their own they are not a verdict on whether you can have a baby. A low number is information for planning, not a diagnosis of the outcome.

The uterus and the cavity. A pelvic ultrasound is standard. Depending on your history, a clinic may ask for a saline infusion sonogram or a hysteroscopy to look for polyps, fibroids distorting the cavity, scarring or a septum — things that are usually fixable but much better found before a transfer than after a failed one.

Tubal assessment, where it is relevant to your case.

A semen analysis, if there is a male partner or partner sperm involved. Ask whether the clinic wants it repeated: results vary a great deal between samples, and one poor analysis is not a conclusion.

Infectious-disease screening for everyone whose gametes are involved — typically HIV, hepatitis B and C, and syphilis. Laboratories require these, and almost all impose a recency window. This is the single most common item people have to redo, purely because it was done too early.

General health markers your clinic specifies, which may include thyroid function and vitamin D, and any screening relevant to your own history.

Genetic carrier screening is optional in most settings but worth discussing, particularly if donor gametes are part of the plan.

The part people get wrong: how you send it

Having the tests is half of it. Getting them accepted is the other half.

• Ask for PDFs of the actual reports, not a summary letter or a screenshot of a patient portal. The clinic needs the laboratory’s own document, with the date and the reference ranges.
• Watch the units. AMH is reported in ng/mL in some countries and pmol/L in others, and the numbers look nothing alike. Sending the raw report with its reference range prevents a misreading that could change your dose.
• Send them before your consultation, not during it. A doctor reading your results for the first time while you sit on a video call cannot give you a considered plan.
• Ask what expires and when. Get a written list of which results have a validity window and how long it is, then work backwards from your travel dates. This is a calendar problem, and it is entirely solvable.
• Keep your own copy of everything, organised by date. You may need it years later, in another country, for a clinic that does not yet exist in your plans.

Three questions worth asking at the first consultation

Which of these can I do at home, and which do you insist on doing yourselves? Some clinics repeat certain tests as a matter of protocol. That can be perfectly reasonable — but you want to know in advance, so it is in the budget and the schedule.

What would change your recommendation? A good answer tells you what the doctor is actually weighing, and turns the workup from a checklist into a conversation.

What happens if something is found? If a hysteroscopy finds a polyp, does that push treatment by a cycle? By three months? Knowing the branch points in advance is what keeps a delay from feeling like a collapse.

None of this substitutes for a consultation with a doctor who knows your history. It is the groundwork that makes that consultation useful — and it is almost all doable before you book anything.

To see how the pieces fit together from the first appointment onward, read the patient journey.