The CNY Fertility Clinic in Albany says every year hundreds of women come through their doors looking for help conceiving a child.

"It stinks to walk through our doors to be quite honest with you," said Christina Gray, a nurse at CNY Fertility. "If you have to come here, you’ve tried other things. You’ve been trying for months, you’ve seen your obstetrictian, they’ve tried to help you. They couldn’t help you. And then you come to us, by the time you get here you feel so defeated."

One cycle of IVF, or in vitro fertilization, can cost around $20,000 depending on where you live in New York. And for over 70 percent of women, it takes more than one cycle for the fertility treatments to be successful. At the CNY clinic, cycles cost around $3,500. But still, nurses like Gray say they see couples going into extreme debt trying to conceive a child.

"I’ll listen to my patients, if you’re telling me you’re on your third mortgage for your home or you have taken out four to five credit cards, I shouldn’t have to worry about that as a nurse but I do," explains Gray. 

A new bill going into effect next year will require large insurance plans to cover up to three cycles of IVF for women of any age. Approximately half of New Yorkers with insurance would qualify for this benefit.

Here is a breakdown of how you might be eligible:  

First, a woman is only covered if she is diagnosed with infertility. There are some exceptions when it comes to covering the cost of storing eggs for women going through chemotherapy.

Second, you must be covered by a large insurance plan, which means it must provide coverage to a 100 employees or more. Anyone on Medicaid or self-insured would not be covered.

"If you want to expand your family, then you should have that chance to do so," says Gray. 

However, Bill Hammond with the Empire Center points out that this IVF bill will raise costs of premiums for these large employers, and says that this could be passed on to employees.  

"We have some of the highest health insurance premiums in the country. Employers don’t have to provide insurance and so if the cost gets too high then they might decide to drop it," cautioned Hammond. 

This new law will go into effect in January.