Fertility Preservation

Delaying Parenthood while Avoiding Infertility

REACH is proud to offer fertility preservation for women who wish to preserve their eggs or embryos. This might include preserving eggs or embryos prior to cancer treatments or for those delaying parenthood to focus on career or for lifestyle reasons. The preservation process consists of cryopreserving (freezing) embryos or eggs to be used at a later time.

Preserving Fertility with Embryo Freezing

What is the Process for Embryo Freezing?

Embryo freezing is a medically accepted way to preserve the possibility of fertility. First, the ovaries are stimulated to mature multiple eggs. Through the process of IVF, doctors remove the mature eggs and fertilize them in the lab with sperm from a partner or donor to create embryos. Embryos are then frozen for future use. The steps required to freeze embryos take between two and six weeks.

Egg (Oocyte) Freezing and Future Use

What does Egg Freezing Entail?

Egg freezing may be an option for women prior to cancer treatment or single women who do not have a male partner and do not want to use donor sperm.

First, the ovaries are stimulated to mature multiple eggs. Doctors then remove the mature eggs and freeze them for future use. As with embryo freezing, the steps required to freeze eggs take between two and six weeks. Once ready for insemination a procedure known as ICSI (intracytoplasmic sperm injection), which a single sperm is injected directly into an egg, is performed.

It is difficult to define the pregnancy rates associated with embryo and egg freezing for cancer patients because available data for this population is limited.

REACH Offers Cancer Patients Assistance and Outreach

Nationally Recognized Programs Provide Support

For patients that are freezing eggs or embryos at REACH prior to any cancer treatment, REACH has partnered with the Fertile Hope, Livestrong™ program to provide support and assistance.
http://www.fertilehope.org/