Washington Post Describes Unbridled Price Hikes For Cryostorage

Industry Experts Predict Steadier Market

 

BY: MEG ST-ESPRIT

There is recent speculation in the media that cryostorage prices are rising. A May 2023 article in The Washington Post noted a 40 percent increase in storage prices in a single year, though they did not cite a source for the statistic.

Inside Reproductive Health was unable to independently verify that statistic. Patients interviewed for the article reported feeling “stuck” or forced to make decisions about storing their genetic material while concerned that the price of cryostorage in the United States will rise.

Within the reproductive health industry, there are less clear-cut answers on pricing trends. 

Are cryostorage prices in the United States actually rising?

Hard data about how much prices have risen remains scarce, though patients report receiving notifications of increases to their monthly or yearly storage bills. 

Eric Widra, chief medical officer at Shady Grove Fertility, was interviewed by the Post. He declined to comment on national pricing trends at this time. Other cryostorage facilities do not expect to raise their prices anytime soon. 

Pete Anevski, CEO of Progyny, expects costs to remain stable for patients. “We can confidently say that costs for our members will not be going up – this includes overall costs and the costs directly associated with tissue freezing and storage” he said in an email.

He added that their pricing structure does not vary depending on the genetic material being stored.

Inside Reproductive Health did reach out to Luis Fernandez, partner at Red Barn Equity Partners, the investor-operator of ReproTech, for commentary on cryostorage pricing trends. Mr. Fernandez did state he would provide commentary but did not respond by publication deadline.

At TMRW Life Sciences, Chief Impact Officer Linsday Beck said that while most of their business is providing B2B storage to fertility clinics, they do have a small sector of their business that offers direct-to-consumer storage options. In both their DTC and B2B sectors, Beck said TMRW Life Sciences has not increased prices in the last year.

She said for the clinics they work directly with they have also not instituted any significant change in pricing structure at this time. “We have not increased our pricing due to inflation, but it's sort of a different beast.” she said in an interview. “We're not an apples-to-apples [comparison] with fertility clinics.” 

What are the barriers to reducing cryostorage costs? 

Dr. Widra cited several reasons via email that clinics may be paying more to store eggs and embryos — a cost that could be passed down to consumers.

The price of hardware such as tanks and monitoring devices as well as square footage to store them in is subject to inflation, like any consumer good. Supplies such as liquid nitrogen as well as electronic monitoring equipment to reduce the risk of tank failure are also expensive, he says. “Liability insurance costs have risen in the wake of the recent tank failures,” he adds.

A 2021 settlement in California awarded patients $15 million in damages after a major storage failure destroyed thousands of samples of genetic material. 

Beck said Many clinics, she said, use a manual system. “It's handwritten labels; it's manually filling in the tag. There is manual inventory. Information is written down either in a binder or an Excel spreadsheet.” This process, she said, is very human-labor intensive.”

As the demand for cryostorage increases, Beck said the best way to keep storage affordable to patients is to automate it. Not only does it reduce labor costs for clinics, it reduces that risk of failure Widra cited. “Robots reduce potential points of failure by 94%. So it's a far better system for a similar price,” she said.” 

Beck noted that cryostorage is not marked up as much as other medical procedures, but due to lack of insurance coverage the cost is largely covered by patients — including unexpected increases.

Despite industry efforts to keep costs low, any increases are passed along to consumers. “So for the patient it does feel expensive,” said Beck. “I think there's a really important perspective to consider.”

The themes reported in this publication are those of the news. They do not reflect the views of Inside Reproductive Health.

 
 

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