General Practitioners

• Osteoporosis
• Arthritis
  Rheumatoid Arthritis: Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a painful, chronic disease, that generally affects people between the ages of 20-60, including women of child-bearing age. (Two to three times more sufferers are women than men.) People with rheumatoid arthritis (arthritis is joint inflammation) will suffer painful swelling in the joints of the fingers, wrists, toes, and/or any other joint in the body. In severe cases, the joint areas of the body may become deformed, or other body systems affected.
• Medical Weight Loss
  Systemic Lupus Erythematosus: Lupus is another autoimmune disorder in which the body's immune system attacks the connective tissues, causing illness and inflammation. Lupus symptoms, which ebb and flow, include a recurring butterfly-shaped rash, hair loss, sensitivity to light, malaise, fatigue, fever, loss of appetite, nausea, joint pain, and weight loss. Severe cases can lead to kidney failure, pleurisy (an inflammation of the lining of the lungs), arthritis, and inflammation of the membrane surrounding the heart. About 9 times as many women as men suffer from lupus--significantly, during child-bearing years -- with some estimates of female cases being as high as one in every 250. Lupus may be a cause of increased uterine infection. Worse, in the context of this book, women with lupus experience an increased incidence of a condition called preeclampsia. Preeclampsia is a condition that can develop in the second half of pregnancy, inducing high blood pressure, fluid retention and protein in the urine, headache, nausea, vomiting and abdominal pain. If untreated, the condition can lead to eclampsia, which can cause seizures, miscarriage, and/or even death.
• Rheumatology
  Dr. Chong received her undergraduate and medical degrees from the University of Hawaii. Her fellowship in Rheumatology was at Cedar's Sinai Medical Center and UCLA. Dr. Chong has been practicing in the field of Reproductive Immunology since 1989, and has researched and published articles in medical journals on related topics. She is board certified and Fellow of American College of Physicians, and Fellow of American College of Rheumatology.
• Emergency Care
  As soon as she and John arrived in Maui, they went to the nearest urgent care clinic they could find. The doctor listened for her baby's heartbeat with a stethoscope. He frowned. He could detect no signs of life. He then arranged to get Dianne into a nearby ultrasound clinic. She and John rushed over, drinking a large bottle of water in the car on the way, so that the test could be performed.
• Infectious Diseases
  All couples requiring immunotherapy are required to undergo comprehensive infectious diseases panel (HIV 1&2, HTLV I/II; Hepatitis A, B, C; VDRL/RPR, others) prior to receiving treatment. ID panels must be 3 months current without exception, and must be repeated every 3 to 4 months or sooner, pending the clinical situation while being treated. Patients are also required to have their blood type and Rh determined.
• Immunizations
  An unexpected miscarriage can shatter dreams. Two or more can be devastating. But now there is hope, and a solution. We offer a proven, painless, highly sophisticated diagnosis and treatment method. By combining cell flow cytometry and immune enhancing vaccinations, our success rate is 80 percent. To date, we have had hundreds of births.

Ophthalmologists

• Cataracts
  Possible adverse reaction(s) to moderate and high doses of prednisone include fluid and electrolyte imbalance; metabolic disturbances e.g. hyperglycemia or gestational diabetes and osteoporosis; susceptibility to infection; peptic ulcer; behavioral changes e.g. nervousness, insomnia, irritability and mood swings; myopathy; and cataracts.

Gynecologists

• Female Infertility
• Endometriosis
  Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology (SART) data has shown that the per-cycle success rate for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) has remained at 24%. Although there has been an increase in success when the cause is male factor infertility and intra-cytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) is implemented, the rate for women whose etiology is female organic pelvic disease has not changed. The reproductive autoimmune failure syndrome (RAFS), first described in 1988, is the association of pregnancy wastage, infertility and endometriosis with circulating autoantibodies. Patients with RAFS have polyclonal B-cell activation; that is, their antibody producing cells including those that manufacture autoantibodies are very active.
• Pregnancy
• Labor and Delivery
  Reproductive Immunology Associates are innovators and leaders in the diagnosis and treatment of immune related miscarriages. The physicians, medical technologists and support staff have a unique and unduplicated experience in working with couples and their physicians. Our daily commitment is to provide an environment where people who have suffered the agony and frustration of frequent miscarriage can come for information, evaluation and results. Enabling our patients the opportunity to experience the joy of childbirth is our greatest reward.

Internists

• Internal Medicine
  Dr. Matzner graduated Phi Beta Kapa from Stanford University. He received his M.D. with Honors from Baylor College of Medicine. In 1988, he was the Soloman Scholar for Resident Research at Cedar Sinai Medical Center. Dr. Matzner subsequently was awarded a PhD in Neuro Economics from Claremont Graduate University. He is board certified in Internal Medicine and Palliative Medicine. He has researched and published extensively on the issue of reproduction and immunology in medical literature. He has been in private practice since 1989, specializing in Reproductive Immunology and Internal medicine.

Psychiatrists

• Insomnia

Endocrinologist

• Diabetes Care
• Hypothyroidism
  Although there is a highly positive correlation between the presence of ATA and fetal loss, no definitive pathophysiology has been identified. Several hypotheses have been proposed to explain this phenomenon. One hypothesis states that these patients have very mild hypothyroidism. Studies to date fail to indicate low thyroid hormone levels in those who miscarried. Proponents suggest that serum hormone levels do not necessarily reflect thyroid dysfunction.
• Thyroid
  In 1990, Stagnaro-Green demonstrated in a prospective analysis that thyroid antibodies were markers for "at-risk" pregnancies. The two antibodies studied, anti-thyroid peroxidase and anti-thyroglobulin antibodies, are collectively referred to as anti-thyroid antibodies (ATA). Many reports have since corroborated the markedly increased prevalence of ATA in women who experience reproductive failure, especially first trimester miscarriages. Pratt, et. al., showed that 67% of women with recurrent first trimester losses had ATA, compared to 17% of controls. None of the participants in either group had clinical manifestations of thyroid disease.

Radiologist

• Ultrasound
  Dianne woke up saturated in her own blood. "I was totally panicked and frightened. We live in the high desert and we were one hour from the nearest hospital. John picked me up and carried me to the car. It was awful. The road was icy. We had to drive carefully. I thought we would never get there. I had an ultrasound (a test using sound waves that permits the fetus to be imaged) and it confirmed that I was losing our baby."

Surgeons

• Laparoscopy
  The physicians at the fertility clinic put Dianne through a battery of tests. One, a laparoscopy, involved inserting a small, flexible tube into Dianne's abdomen, through which the physicians were able to view her ovaries and fallopian tubes. Another test involved inserting dye into the uterus, which flowed into the fallopian tubes. This procedure could reveal tissue abnormalities, such as fibroid tumors, which might prevent the growing embryo from implanting. (During the first 10 weeks of gestation, the embryo anchors itself to the uterus. If it is unable to do so, a miscarriage will result.) Dianne also had an endometrial biopsy, in which a small tissue sample from her uterus was taken to Determine whether the depth and plumpness of her uteral lining would satisfactorily nourish the growing embryo. (see Chapter 2.)

Dermatologists

• Ulcer

Physical Therapists

• Back Pain

Allergists

• Allergies