Since then, IVF has become a common solution for thousands of infertile persons around the world. According to the CDC, nearly 140,000 IVF cycles were carried out in the United States alone in 2006.
Part of the IVF process is to hyper-stimulate the woman’s ovaries to release as many of her eggs as possible. This step is costly and can be painful and doctors prefer to do this step only once.
The eggs are immediately fertilized with the man’s semen and embryos are created – many times far more than can be used in the first embryo transfer cycle. The remaining embryos are frozen. They will be used by this same couple for their own future frozen embryo transfers (FET).
When they have completed their family building, often frozen embryos will remain.
According to a study by RAND – SART in 2002, over 400,000 embryos were frozen in storage in the United States. In the years since 2002, it is now likely that over 500,000 embryos are stored throughout the U.S.
While the debate continues as to how this dilemma should be handled – both legally and ethically – one option for couples in this situation is to donate their embryos to another family.
Do you know anyone who has remaining embryos or has pursued an embryo adoption?
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