Egg freezing: what is it and what is the appropriate age?
My article in frezyland.gr
A woman’s chances of conceiving naturally decrease as she gets older, because both the quality and number of her eggs decrease. More specifically, fertility begins to decline as a woman approaches 30 and the decline is most significant after the age of 35. This is because each woman is born with a certain number of eggs (ovarian reserve) that is depleted over time. The solution to this problem is to freeze or freeze the eggs.
What is egg freezing?
Egg freezing is a way of preserving fertility and involves freezing eggs when the woman is younger and therefore has more and better quality eggs. The process involves collecting and freezing the eggs, with the ultimate aim of thawing them (if necessary) so that they can be used in fertility treatment.
Which women can benefit from the procedure?
Apart from egg freezing for medical reasons (e.g. for a condition that will negatively affect fertility, such as cancer treatment), the main indication is for women who are not ready to have a child or have not yet found a suitable partner. Let us also not forget that the demands of modern life are many and the dilemma of career or family is more relevant than ever. We could therefore say that egg freezing is a kind of “investment” that acts as an insurance policy for the future and allows us to avoid making quick and personal decisions. Finally, it is worth noting that women who have undergone the egg freezing procedure may never use their frozen eggs (as they may conceive naturally in the future).
What does egg freezing involve?
The procedure is similar to IVF and usually takes about 10-12 days. It involves the use of hormonal injectables aimed at stimulating the ovaries to boost egg production. When these eggs mature, they are collected in a simple procedure called egg retrieval. At this point, instead of being mixed with sperm (as in IVF), they are frozen using the vitrification technique (rapid freezing with excellent success rates) and stored. The storage period for oocytes is a maximum of 10 years.
Most women will collect around 10-15 eggs, although this is not always possible for all, especially for women with low ovarian reserve (low ovarian reserve). If the patient wants to use them in the future, they are thawed and then injected with the husband/partner’s sperm (as in the case of IVF). The main advantage is that during thawing, the “age” of the eggs is that of the freezing age. The whole procedure is safe and side effects from fertility drugs are rare.
How many eggs should I freeze and what is the appropriate age?
To be able to answer this question we first need to define the estimated live birth rate (eLBR). eLBR can be defined as the probability of having a baby from frozen eggs when they are used later in life.
The main factor affecting eLBR is the age of the woman. In other words, younger women are able to freeze more eggs per cycle than women of older reproductive age. Also, it should be noted that as age increases, a higher percentage of eggs will be genetically abnormal (“poor quality” eggs). Thus, to have a good chance of having a baby from frozen eggs (high eLBR), a woman over 40 years old will need to freeze significantly more eggs than a woman under 35 years old. For example, a 40-year-old woman may need to freeze more than 20 eggs (and may need to undergo several cycles of ovarian stimulation to achieve this number), while a 35-year-old woman may need 8-10 eggs. Therefore, ideally egg freezing should ideally be done under the age of 35.
