Egg Freezing
Egg freezing is a method of collecting and preserving a woman’s eggs in liquid nitrogen ‘deep freeze’ for possibly many years until she is ready to use them to try to conceive. Egg freezing may also be referred to as oocyte cryopreservation.
This section outlines the three egg freezing services MFS offers:
- a ‘rapid-response’ emergency egg freezing service for cancer patients
- a comprehensive three-stage elective egg freezing service for:
- women at risk of premature ovarian failure or early menopause
- women who need to delay conception while receiving non-cancer medical treatment
- single women who wish to ‘preserve’ their fertility
- an alternative to embryo freezing for patients who require IVF or ICSI treatment
Eggs are the largest single cell in the human body and until recently, freezing and thawing them without damage was a scientific challenge. Now, with the birth of hundreds of healthy ‘frozen egg babies’ around the world, new techniques to successfully freeze and thaw eggs give the chance of genetic motherhood to some women that previously were not available.
However, egg freezing offers no guarantees of successful future conception and pregnancy and it is always preferable for women not to delay conceiving if possible. The chance of a woman achieving a successful pregnancy is higher when she conceives before the age of 35.
MFS has held a license for egg freezing from the HFEA since 2000 and, to date (March 2011), the eggs which resulted in the birth of all seven babies born in the UK following the freezing of the mothers’ own eggs were all collected and frozen at MFS. In addition, MFS is the only UK clinic to have achieved livebirths from flash-frozen eggs - that is, eggs frozen using the vitrification process - with the birth of two babies since December 2010. Evidence suggests that vitrification may improve pregnancy rates by increasing the survival rates of the eggs after thawing from 65% to 95%.
Costs
Cost of ovarian reserve test at MFS: £300
Cost of the elective egg freezing preparation service at MFS: £425
Cost of egg freezing at MFS: £2,800