ABC of Egg Donation

In the field of fertility, egg donation is the process when a female donates her eggs to help other women conceive and provide help in reproduction. Not to confuse our readers, we will explain the procedure in the simplest way. The collection of eggs from the donor takes place in clinics and is done through the short surgical procedure. The collected “product” then can be fertilized in the laboratory, using the “in vitro fertilization”(IVF) technique or can be frozen and stored until the later use.

 

Egg donor ⇒ Eggs X Father’s sperm ⇒ Surrogate mother

Egg donor ⇒ Eggs X Father’s sperm ⇒ Mother

Egg donor ⇒ Eggs ⇒ Freezing and keeping until one of processes above needs to occur

 

Parents may consider finding an egg donor for a number of reasons including :

 

  • Eggs of the female partner can not lead to pregnancy (This can happen due to number of fertility issues)
  • Parent is a single male
  • Both parents are males

 

In case of traditional couples, as you have seen in the second scheme, the absence of ability to become a genetic mother does not necessarily mean that a female can not carry a child.  There are a lot of cases when a couple uses egg donation for fertilization but embryo is developed in mother’s uterus.

 

As you may have already noticed, children born with the donation procedure have genetic inheritance from egg donors and for that reason, it is of greatest importance that parents don’t choose the candidates independently. A lot of details need to be taken into consideration and donors are usually found with the help of agencies that own all of the essential data to help parents with the suitable choice. Data we are talking about, apart from appearance, includes proof of mental and physical health. We will discuss the process of choosing egg donors as well as suitable agencies step by step in our later posts.

 

Parents should not be doubted about the motivation of egg donors. Researches have shown that there are two reasons females choose to participate in the reproduction process – Altruism, monetary interest and of course the combination of both. Egg donors have no right to request any kind of information about parents or children and are out of the process once their contribution is compensated. However, it’s parents who may choose to get in touch with donors out of interest, reassuring in their choice or the intention to inform their child about genetics later.

 

However, the process is not as simple as it may seem as laws regulating egg donation vary from country to country. It may be completely restricted in one place, partially regulated in another and somewhat simplified in the third one.  As you have been shortly introduced to egg donation, we now are ready to discuss above described procedures in details.