Egg Freezing
Egg freezing, also called oocyte cryopreservation, is an option for women who wish to preserve their fertility. Dr. Kelly and our team at Society Hill Reproductive Medicine are widely known for excellence in egg freezing. Dr. Kelly hosts regular informational events to help women learn more about egg freezing.
Why Might One Consider Egg Freezing?
Fertility is intimately connected to the age of the woman attempting conception. Age related decline in egg quality is well recognized and difficult to treat.
One of the major recent advances in the field of reproductive medicine is the capability to successfully freeze (cryopreserve) eggs. Cryopreserved eggs maintain the inherent quality reflecting the age at which they were frozen.
Egg freezing is beneficial for women wishing to preserve their fertility in a number of circumstances. One of the most common reasons women do so is to delay childbearing. This allows us to address the most intractable cause of difficulty conceiving, namely the age-related decline in egg quality.
The likelihood of infertility increases with age because of a decline in egg quality. Egg quality is at its peak at age 26, and a measurable decline begins thereafter. This decline becomes steeper at age 35 and above. The change in egg quality not only makes getting pregnant more difficult, but also raises the chances of miscarriage and chromosomal abnormalities.
Freezing, or cryopreserving, eggs maintains the age and quality of the eggs at the time they are frozen.
Who Freezes Their Eggs?
Some examples of women we see who choose to freeze their eggs are:
Women in the midst of achieving educational and career goals who wish to delay conception. Generally these accomplishments occur during the years when we know eggs are most fertile. Freezing eggs at an early age provides a greater chance of conception in the future.
Women who are not in a relationship or need more time for the relationship they are in to develop before considering or attempting conception.
Women with a family history of early menopause. The average age of menopause is 52. Having a close relative (e.g. mother, aunt) with an age of menopause earlier than 52 increases an individual’s chances of having the same experience. In other words, it is a risk factor for a shorter reproductive lifespan than in the general population.
Women who have had or about to have treatments such as ovarian surgery, chemotherapy or radiation, each of which can lead to a decrease or total loss of eggs. Society Hill Reproductive Medicine is a proud member of LIVESTRONG's Fertility Program. As a participating center, we work with LIVESTRONG to increase access to fertility preservation services for cancer patients. To apply or for more information, please visit www.livestrong.org. In addition, we offer steep discounts on fertility preservation cycles under these circumstances and work with our pharmaceutical partners to obtain free medicine.
Transgender individuals prior to beginning hormones or having surgery during the transition period.
Women with endometriosis, which is known to hasten a decline in ovarian reserve compared to women without endometriosis.
What Is Involved in the Egg Freezing Process?
Egg freezing is made up of the first two phases of an In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) cycle, ovulation induction and egg retrieval. It takes approximately 4 weeks to complete the egg freezing process. Most commonly, during the first 7 to 14 days, one takes birth control pills to suppress the ovaries. Then, in the phase we call ovulation induction, we use medications over approximately 10 days to stimulate multiple eggs to develop. The response to these medications is carefully monitored using blood work and ultrasound tests and requires approximately 4 to 6 visits to the office.
Once the eggs are determined to be at a mature state an egg retrieval procedure is performed. The procedure lasts about 15-20 minutes and occurs under IV sedation. The mature eggs are immediately frozen and stored in the IVF laboratory, where they can stay frozen for an indefinite period of time. If later on you are unable to conceive naturally and need to use these eggs to get pregnant, we will thaw and fertilize the eggs and place a resulting embryo into the uterus in a procedure called an embryo transfer.
Are There Ways to Assess My Fertility?
In order to determine whether egg freezing is right for you, it’s important to assess your current fertility. Age is the most important and most accurate factor in predicting one’s fertility. We can also perform diagnostic tests to provide some additional insight into the number of eggs remaining in the ovaries and their quality. The diagnostic tests involve blood work and ultrasound.
