Two-and-a-half year old Quinten is enamored with his mother’s smartphone.

As his parents talk, he sits quietly watching a cartoon.

He is calm, content and a little shy.

More than three years ago, Quinten was frozen as an embryo in liquid nitrogen as his parents went through the stressful process of bypassing infertility.

“Our joke is, because he’s so calm and mellow  – he’s got this great disposition – because he was frozen, it chilled him out for awhile,” said Quinten’s mother, Jennifer Lehr, with a laugh. “We’re hoping the next one is just as calm and relaxed.”

Jennifer and Tom Lehr of Kirkland are expecting a little girl at the end of June, and after she is settled in, they hope to unfreeze their last embryo and give it another go at Kirkland’s new infertility clinic, Poma Fertility.

Dr. Michael Opsahl and partner Dr. Klaus Wiemer were initially the Lehr’s doctors at a previous clinic, but after the doctors left their old practice when it sold, they decided to start over and open Poma Fertility on Feb. 11. So far, it’s been a success.

With renewed gusto, Opsahl and Wiemer worked to create a fertility clinic that offered In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) for all families by significantly reducing its cost for self-pay patients.

IVF is the process of stimulating the women’s body to produce many eggs, which are retrieved by a doctor. The eggs are then fertilized and cultured for several days. Typically, two embryos are implanted back in the uterus while the rest are frozen for later use. Sometimes the embryos attach, sometimes they don’t.

The Lehrs had a total of eight embryos.

According to Dr. Opsahl, the average price for an IVF cycle can be up to $15,000 by the time all of the different treatments are totaled. Poma Fertility offers self-pay patients one set price of $8,500 for an IVF cycle (that rate does not include certain treatments, such as cycle medication). But for those who have insurance, pricing differs because each ultrasound or blood work is billed on a line-by-line basis. Nonetheless, Opsahl said two out of three patients do not have insurance coverage.

“Often when you go to an infertility clinic when you need IVF, it’s like going to a restaurant,” Opsahl said. “You have a menu, and depending upon your medical condition, you choose different selections off the menu. If you end up needing more office visits, you get an extra bill at the end. We’ve taken that away.”

Their Refund Warranty Program also allows for 90 percent cash back if families cannot get pregnant.

Remedying some of the stress and confusion by reducing cost could have more benefits than saving money. Dr. Opsahl explains there’s a fair amount of research that stress can hinder a couple’s ability to get pregnant.

“We thought, let’s try to take out as much of the financial aspect of it that creates angst, anxiety, turmoil,” said Wiemer, “so that people can focus on their treatment going into it, that this is what it’s going to cost in the beginning, and then at the end there won’t be any surprises, which can happen a lot.”

But for couples such as the Lehrs, spending thousands of dollars to get pregnant was something they were able to work out, even though many families cannot.

“Honestly, I have no idea how we’ve gotten here today, financially,” Jennifer said. “Family is one thing we both knew we really wanted so we were going to do whatever it took to get it.”

“Whether it be cashing out retirement…” Tom added.

“Yep, we’re going to work until we’re 100. It’s all worth it to us,” Jennifer said. “I think most people who are put into our position find a way to make it happen because you become so passionate about it and it’s just what you want.”

Whether families have a baby or not, going through fertility treatments and IVF cycles can be emotionally trying and having a clinic that caters to the individual family is necessary for many.

“(In the beginning) we were referred to a much larger practice and we went in there and it just didn’t feel… we kind of felt like a number. We didn’t have that personal feel,” Jennifer said. “Then we had some referrals over to their practice. When you walked in, you literally got the feeling that you were the only person that they were working with. You were the only couple. You felt like you mattered. They knew you by name. The staff knew who you were and you know, when you’re going through a process like this, you need that warm fuzzy cuddly feeling because it’s hard.”

At Poma, Dr. Opsahl said he sees the patients all the way through, which can help because it’s already confusing for families.

Wiemer adds, because Poma utilizes a smaller lab, the variables are easier to control and the faces are easier to remember.

“I’ve managed some really large labs and it does become a blur,” Wiemer said. “But when laboratories get so big, the variables that can control and impact the outcome can become larger because you have a lot more people doing stuff … You’re trying to mimic in the laboratory what mother nature and evolution have done for millions of years and that’s not a trivial thing to do.”

In addition to less expensive IVF treatments, Poma Fertility offers egg freezing, or vitrification, for women who want to wait for children; they specialize in Oncofertility; and genetic testing, among other services.

For more information, contact Poma Fertility at 425-822-7662 or email info@pomafertility.com.