Egg freezing

Egg freezing, also known as the oocyte preservation is a method of woman’s fertility preservation that allows women to postpone their motherhood and increase their chances to get pregnant in the future when the time comes.

What is exactly meant by egg freezing?

The woman’s chances to get pregnant decrease as they get older but the exact age when woman stops producing quality eggs varies. Egg freezing is now considered as one of the breakthrough methods of woman’s fertility preservations and includes ovarian stimulation, egg retrieval and freezing.

The egg freezing journey starts with your first visit to the doctor who will assess your ovarian reserve, test your hormone levels, evaluate your fertility and general health. Your doctor will prepare you for the start of the ovarian stimulation. This process takes up to two weeks and involves daily hormone injections that induce the maturation of multiple follicles at the same time. During that time, you need to visit your doctor for vaginal ultrasounds and the measurement of hormone levels to see your response to medication. At the day 10-12 of the stimulation, when the follicles are ready for the retrieval the woman does her last trigger injection to reach the final maturation of eggs and 36 hours after that she comes for her egg collection. This is a surgical procedure which is done under sedative medication and takes up to 20 minutes. While you are asleep, the doctor under the ultrasound guidance advances the thin needle to each follicle and aspirates the fluid and the egg to the test tubes.

After that, embryologists take these test tubes and under the microscope identify mature eggs, prepare them for the freezing your eggs and then freeze them all until the woman decides to use them in the future. The vitrification technique is used to cryopreserve the biological material and allows your eggs to get frozen very quickly without damaging them. Once the egg retrieval is over, you wake up and spend a few hours under the doctor’s control and then you are free to leave the clinic.

Why consider egg freezing?

A lot of women consider or start their egg freezing each day. The reasons can be very different. Some women decide to delay their pregnancy due to personal reasons such as getting a good education, other women want to improve their financial state, develop their career, etc. Another reason why women make this decision is the medical one. The doctor may recommend egg freezing due to the cancer where chemotherapy or radiation therapy are required which will affect woman’s fertility in the future. There are several medical conditions where there is an indication to remove ovaries and egg freezing becomes the good opportunity to have biological children one day. The risk of hereditary early menopause or premature ovarian failure are also good reasons to consider the fertility preservation.

What is the most common age for egg freezing?

There have been a lot of studies done to see what age would be the best for the egg freezing procedure. Women of different ages decide to freeze their eggs at some point of their lives, but what all doctors agree on – is that this has to be the age when woman has a good ovarian reserve and can produce eggs of a good quality. If we are talking about when women use it these will be women in their thirties who typically have the good number of eggs of a good quality. Motherhood is not something women worry in their twenties and when time goes by, the quality and the number of eggs that can be retrieved rapidly decrease which makes the freezing eggs at 40 or around this age not that efficient.

How to use your eggs in the future?

Once you make a decision of starting your family, your eggs will be warmed and fertilized by your partner’s or donor’s sperm at the same day. Then go 5 days of the embryo culture where embryologists assess the development of your embryos until the blastocyst stage. At day five the doctor will transfer one or several embryos into your previously prepared uterine cavity to reach the pregnancy.

Why Ukraine is one of the best countries to go for your egg freezing?

The fact that Ukraine has become one of the most popular destinations for all types of IVF treatments can be supported by lots of people who have already visited this country due to this reason, including the egg freezing one. First of all, the main advantage is the affordable price as people from other countries, where it is rather expensive can do several cycles in Ukraine without great expenses. Another reason is the high quality of medical services and care during your egg freezing. Any reputable clinic and/or agency will take care of you feeling safe and comfortable while coming for your oocyte cryopreservation to Ukraine. One of the biggest benefits worth mentioning is the storage cost as after your eggs are retrieved they will be staying cryopreserved for several years. By having your eggs stored at the cryobank in Ukraine, the yearly fee for the storage of your eggs might not even be felt for your budget. Finally, Ukraine is a very beautiful and culturally rich country. Parens Fertility is located in the great city Lviv, that is considered to be a soul of Ukraine and exploring new country, its history and culture will make this experience unforgettable.