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About
Ask about the bill and you are asking Katherine McDaniel in her capacity as a researcher. Price transparency in fertility medicine is one of her published subjects, alongside oncofertility, preimplantation genetic testing and disorders of sexual development — and it is the only one of those four that most patients cannot get a straight answer on elsewhere. A consultant’s instinct shows: she has spent years in rooms where a quote has to itemize itself.
That is a late-career overlay on an unusual route. She grew up in Northern California, read history at Boston College, then spent five years in management consulting across Munich, London and Singapore before returning to the US for medical school at UC Irvine, OB/GYN residency at USC, and REI fellowship at UCLA. She is now an assistant professor in USC’s obstetrics and gynecology department, Head of Oncofertility within its reproductive endocrinology division, and assistant fellowship program director — meaning she also designs the training of the next cohort of fertility specialists. She took a 2020 Pacific Coast Reproductive Society Physician Scholarship and an ACOG Lobby Day Grant the same year, and a California Institute for Regenerative Medicine grant in 2024.
She has presented at national meetings including the ASRM Scientific Congress, and she runs cycles at HRC’s Pasadena center on South Lake Avenue, the group’s anchor site, where the in-house laboratory, operating suite and donor and surrogacy programs sit. Board-certified in obstetrics and gynecology and a Fellow of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, she consults in English and Spanish. Off the clock she is a Boston Marathon finisher and has hiked Mount Whitney — a detail that at least tells you what she thinks about a long, scheduled, physically demanding sequence of events.
Clinical Expertise
- IVF cycle management: stimulation, monitoring, retrieval and transfer, with protocol choices argued from published evidence rather than clinic default
- Oncofertility: egg, embryo and tissue banking coordinated against a chemotherapy or radiation start date, in the role of USC’s designated Head of Oncofertility
- Preimplantation genetic testing: PGT-A chromosome screening and PGT-M for single-gene conditions, including where a biopsy result is ambiguous, what mosaicism does to reliability, and what testing cannot exclude
- Egg freezing for medical and elective indications: yield expectations by age and reserve, storage costs over time, and the economics of banking now versus later
- Disorders of sexual development: evaluation in a multidisciplinary setting, with an emphasis on how much is genuinely urgent
- Cost-structured treatment planning: what each add-on costs, what it changes, and which line items are negotiable — the applied version of her research subject
Why Choose Dr. McDaniel
She studies the pricing problem she treats you for. Very few practicing reproductive endocrinologists publish on cost transparency in their own field. A patient who wants a cycle quoted item by item, with an argument about which expensive add-ons change live-birth odds, is asking her a research question.
Head of Oncofertility at USC. A named institutional role in fertility preservation for cancer patients, which usually means she is the person clinics call when a 26-year-old needs banks before a treatment protocol starts.
Academic appointment plus private-practice cycles. Assistant professor and assistant fellowship program director alongside a Pasadena patient panel: her protocol reasoning is exposed to trainees and to literature review, not only to her own habits.
A non-clinical education in economics of a different kind. A history degree and five years of consulting in three countries is an odd background on a fertility roster, and it tends to produce physicians who explain trade-offs instead of issuing instructions.
English and Spanish consultations, with a grant record — CIRM 2024, PCRS 2020 — that indicates externally reviewed research rather than a publication list of case reports.
Professional Affiliations
Board-certified by the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology in Obstetrics and Gynecology, and a Fellow of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (FACOG), with subspecialty fellowship training in Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility at UCLA. Assistant Professor, Head of Oncofertility, and Assistant Fellowship Program Director in the Division of Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility at USC. Active member of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, the Pacific Coast Reproductive Society, ACOG, the American Medical Association and the California Medical Association. CIRM grant recipient (2024); PCRS Physician Scholarship and ACOG Lobby Day Grant recipient (2020).
Suitable For
Anyone assembling a budget before committing to a clinic. Treatment planning where the money question is answered with the same seriousness as the medical one.
Cancer patients with a narrow window before treatment. Banking eggs or embryos against an oncology calendar, handled by the physician holding USC’s oncofertility role.
Families undecided about PGT. Screening framed honestly — what an embryo biopsy can tell you, what it can miss, and whether it changes your odds enough to justify its price.
Diminished reserve or a previous cycle that underperformed. Protocol reasoning that has to survive academic scrutiny, plus a willingness to discuss what is not yet known.
Spanish-speaking patients, and patients who want a physician comfortable explaining, not just informing.