Egg Freezing – Fertility and Women

By Yemi Adesanya-Famuyiwa, MD

Montgomery Fertility Center

. http://montgomeryfertilitycenter.com/

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Egg Freezing – Fertility and Women

Egg freezing can be an option for women who have religious or ethical reasons for not creating supernumerary embryos (more embryos than are needed). It allows for the option of fertilizing only the eggs sufficient to make only the precise number of embryos that will be implanted.

Egg freezing is also an option for cancer patients seeking to preserve their fertility potential prior to cancer treatment.

It can also be seen as an option for patients who have social or personal reasons for freezing their eggs. Many athletes may choose this option since their peak athletic performance may also coincide with the peak quality of their eggs.

Egg freezing is one of the most common services offered at fertility facilities, and the recovery rate for frozen eggs is about 90% or more in a highly skilled lab.

For women under the age of 35, it is recommended to freeze 10-20 mature eggs to have up to a 90% chance of a live birth using their eggs in the future.

For women older than 35 years, 20-30 mature eggs should be frozen to have close to 70% chance of a future live birth. Since older patients may have fewer eggs, they may need more than one cycle.

To get started an initial work up including testing of your reproductive hormones, usually on the second to fourth day of the menstrual cycle is needed.

Various protocols can be used to stimulate the ovaries in order to collect the eggs. The stimulation of the ovaries can take 10 days followed by collection, also called retrieval of the eggs.

Egg collection is done under mild sedation provided by board certified anesthesiologists.