Egg freezing program (Oocyte Cryopreservation)

Bangkok IVF Center currently offers egg freezing program (Oocyte Cryopreservation) to women who are planning to use their own eggs in the future due to aging problem or malignancy prior to chemotherapy.

As the chances of getting pregnant decline as you grow older, egg freezing program gives women an opportunity to preserve their fertility potential by preserving fertile eggs in frozen form.

This procedure is ideal for women who facing chemotherapy for cancer treatment since eggs in their ovaries will become damaged after chemotherapy. So preserving their fertile eggs prior to chemotherapy will be the only way to preserve their fertility.

Fertility of women become lower as they grow older, after 35 years of age, their fecundity begins to be lower and after 40 years of age, it will be difficult to get pregnant. Freezing eggs at younger age is the way to prevent age barrier and maintain the good chance of pregnancy.

Not only you can store eggs for future usage, but also you can freeze extra eggs from assisted reproduction technology programs such as IVF or ICSI instead of freezing embryos which will be another way to prevent moral or ethical concerns about destruction of unused frozen embryos since eggs are not considered as life form.

Usage of frozen eggs:

There can be wide variation in the percentage of eggs that survive freeze and thaw process. It is possible that no eggs will survive the freeze and thaw process at all. Eggs are kept in liquid nitrogen tank until thawing is performed. Eggs can theoretically be stored for years and viable after thawing. Thawed eggs require sperm injection or ICSI for fertilization. Even with viable eggs after thawing, embryos developed after fertilization may not guarantee pregnancy. In order to obtain eggs for freezing, you have to go through control ovarian hyperstimulation program similar to those who undergo IVF program. Eggs are then retrieved via sonographically guided transvaginal needle aspiration under intravenous sedation.

The work up for egg freezing program is similar to those with IVF program. The difference is that the eggs are frozen while still unfertilized. Once the eggs are planned to used, they had to be thawed and ICSI is required to initiate fertilization before embryos are growing enough to be transferred.