Egg Freezing Process - Step by Step Procedure, Success Rate and Cost

Medically, the optimum age range for egg freezing is between 30 and 34 years. However, a study published in the ‘Journal Fertility and Sterility’ in 2015, found out that women can benefit best from frozen eggs between the age of 25 to 30 years.

Most women do not experience any pain in egg freezing. Egg freezing is comfortable and safe. The truth is, the idea of egg freezing is a lot worse than the procedure in real.

Once you freeze the eggs, you can use them in the future when you and your partner are ready to conceive a baby. The egg can be fertilized either by using its own sperm or donor sperm. Once the fertilized eggs develop into an embryo, it is implanted into the uterus of the woman where the pregnancy continues for the next 9 months.

There is no medically proven test to date to check the quality of frozen eggs. The only way to evaluate the quality of the eggs that have been frozen is to get them fertilized. If the fertilization is successful, the fertility specialist runs a genetic test on the embryo to check its quality.

Reports published in the USC Fertility state that frozen eggs can be stored for longer than 14 years. There are no studies that state any genetic defects or birth defects in the case of frozen eggs. There are no pregnancy risks involved in the case of eggs that are frozen for long years.

Simply put, you can freeze your eggs when you have ample quality eggs but are not willing to conceive at present. The best time to freeze your eggs ideally is late 20s and late 30s. Women ideally have optimum egg quantity and premium egg quality during this age. Every woman is born with an egg reserve that diminishes in quality as she ages. By the time a woman is 30, she is usually left with only a 5 percent chance of conceiving a baby.

For a successful live birth, a woman should store at least 30-40 eggs. To store 30-40 mature eggs, she has to undergo at least 2-5 cycles of treatment before storing her eggs. Having a large egg reserve increases the chance of retrieving a mature egg but does not always guarantee a live birth.

Yes, freezing your eggs at the age of 35 is possible. But since the ovaries will produce a fewer number of eggs, the chances of extracting a mature egg will be minimal at 35 years. The chance of having a successful pregnancy by freezing eggs at 35 is much lower and hence it is recommended to freeze the eggs much earlier.

Egg freezing is ideally a safe fertility technique and no major risks are involved in the procedure either to the mother or the offspring. Although rare, there has been evidence of congenital structural abnormalities in the case of offspring born from egg freezing.

No. Egg freezing won’t lower your ovarian reserve and won’t decrease your chances of getting pregnant naturally in the future. In simpler words, egg freezing has no direct association with fertility.

Approximately, 30-40 eggs are required for a woman for a reasonable chance of a live birth. A woman needs to undergo at least 2-5 treatment cycles to store at least 30-40 mature eggs. Having a large number of mature eggs increases the chances of a successful pregnancy but it does not guarantee a live birth.

Egg freezing may cause minor side effects like abdominal pain, bloating, vomiting and diarrhea. These side effects are likely to go away with time and proper medication. There is a very rare possibility for egg freezing to cause any severe side effects.

Egg freezing cost in India INR 1,10,000 to INR 1,30,000. This cost is inclusive of the medicines and injections given during the ovarian stimulation, the charges of the egg retrieval procedure, and the subsequent cost of the freezing procedure and hence the freezing of the eggs cost differently for each person.

The risks associated with oocyte cryopreservation is similar to that of ovarian stimulation for IVF. The common risks are ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome, infection and bleeding disorders related to egg retrieval.

The main difference between freezing eggs vs. freezing embryos is that freezing embryos requires sperm/insemination.

There are basically three steps involved in egg freezing – ovarian stimulation, egg retrieval, and egg freezing.

Ovarian stimulation

• Medications will be stimulated into the ovaries to aid the production of multiple eggs.
• The fertility specialist may inject medication such as follitropin alfa or beta (Follistim AQ, Gonal-f) or menotropins (Menopur) or prescribe injectable gonadotropin-releasing hormone.
• The doctor will monitor you during the procedure and keep a check on how the body reacts to the medicine.
• Typically, estrogen levels increase when ovarian follicles develop.
• After 10-14 days of medication, the follicles are ready for retrieving.

Egg retrieval

• Egg retrieval can be done either in the clinic or the hospital.
• Transvaginal aspiration is the most common approach to egg retrieval. During the procedure, an ultrasound probe is inserted into the vagina to identify the follicles.
• The doctor then guides a needle into the follicle. Using a suction device, the doctor removes/ retrieves the egg from the follicle. More the number of retrieved eggs, the higher the chances of live birth.
• Egg retrieval is a comparatively painful procedure than any other stage of the process and may involve mild cramping and bleeding. 

Egg freezing

• Once the eggs are retrieved, they are harvested and preserved for future use. 
• The most common procedure to freeze eggs is known as vitrification. The word ‘vitrification’ comes from the Latin term for glass, vitreum. Vitrification is the process of freezing so rapidly that the water molecules don’t have time to form ice crystals, and instead instantaneously solidify into a glass-like structure.