Are we meeting the needs of patients/clients to comprehensively educate or is their a void w/in which uncredentialed service providers (i.e. Independent Infertility Consultants) are now marketing (and charging for) services we, as licensed professionals should be providing?

As a long-term patient advocate (beginning my career in infertility working on complex legislative matters regarding insurance coverage for patients) and as a former Chair of Education for RESOLVE New York City, I believe that clinics, mental health providers and legal counsel have an obligation to “educate” on matters critical to the outcome of alternative family building efforts….and I value greatly the passion and commitment of  non-profits like RESOLVE and the American Fertility Assocation who consistently provide year-round educational events led by professionals who present pro-bono and where the attendance fee is nominal.

I am, frankly, curious, about this new level of service (and related fees) of these so-called “infertility consultants and educators” clients tell me they have been solicited to engage with when most, if not all of that “education” should be coming from licensed professionals. …what is the value added by these so-called independents and does the consumer really need another layer of service provider and another expense or is the call really to the clinics and attnys and MHPs to be meeting all of the “educational” needs of the IPs.

Alternative family building is a medical, legal, psychosocial and financial matter …professionals with education AND experience AND licensing/credentials in those fields are obligated (by nature of our credentials and licensure) to competently educate IPs and donors. If there is a void in education, the answer is not necessarily ”independents” (whatever that it) but rather a call to better education in the clinic, in the psychosocial practitioners office and in the attnys office…it is the reason we are required to be licensed to practice, b/c we have heightened standards of care.

I am and always will be a patient/donor advocate and on behalf of patients, I raise question of these “consultants”…it is just the way I was trained.