The Egg Donation Process
The egg donation process
When a qualified donor and a screened recipient couple match and intend to undergo a fresh embryo transfer–meaning that the embryos are not frozen-thawed–the donor and recipient cycles are synchronized. To accomplish this, the recipient patient begins estrogen and progesterone supplementation to mimic a natural cycle. At the same time, the donor receives FSH (follicle-stimulating hormone) injections, which stimulate the ovaries to develop multiple eggs. Those eggs are eventually retrieved and used in the IVF procedure. The donor’s cycle will then be monitored with vaginal ultrasounds and blood work to determine when the eggs are mature. Once the follicles are mature, the office schedules the egg retrieval. Egg retrievals from egg donors can yield an average of 18 to19 eggs
Once we retrieve the eggs from the donor, an embryologist examines them and combines them with the recipient’s partner’s sperm or donated sperm to form embryos.
Ideally, sperm is collected from the male patient on the morning of the retrieval if it is coming from an intended parent. Dallas-Fort Worth Fertility Associates provides a private collection room in the andrology department separate from the center’s IVF lab and procedure rooms. We then prepare and inseminate the sperm with the eggs about 4-6 hours after the egg retrieval, or egg thawing frozen eggs are used. Insemination occurs using either conventional insemination or sperm injection into the egg(s) using ICSI (intracytoplasmic sperm injection) Our lab then evaluates the embryos at 16, 40, and 64 hours following insemination to determine the fertilization of oocytes and to monitor their development. We select the embryos that have developed appropriately and incubate them until ready to transfer.
Five days following the egg retrieval procedure, the embryo transfer will occur. During this process, a very soft, flexible catheter is placed into the uterus through the cervix. The first pregnancy test occurs 9 days after a Day 5 embryo transfer, which is 14 days after the egg retrieval.
[For Donors] anchor link to “Donating Your Eggs at Dallas-Fort Worth Fertility Associates”
[For Parents] anchor link to “Building Your Family with Donor Eggs at Dallas-Fort Worth Fertility Associates”