What is Embryo Freezing/ Embryo Cryopreservation? Process & Its Benefits!
- What Exactly Embryo Freezing Like?
- Why Do People Freeze Embryos?
- Procedure—How is Embryo Freezing/Cryopreservation Done?
- Difference Between Egg Freezing & Embryo Freezing
- Who Can Benefit?
- Is IVF Frozen Embryo Transfer (FET) Vs Fresh IVF—Which is Best?
- Best Egg Freezing Center in Hyderabad
With the advances in fertility treatment and breakthroughs in assisted reproductive technologies, now millennials can preserve their future fertility. Cryopreservation allows people to freeze and store eggs, sperms, and embryos and lets them have children later in life.
In fertility medicine, vitrification is the process used for cryopreservation/freezing of eggs, sperms, and even embryos.
There are just a few considerations to weigh when people are thinking about the cryopreservation that could be due to social reasons and another one is medical reasons.
Wonder how embryo freezing works, here, we will delve deep in:
What Exactly Embryo Freezing Like?
Embryo freezing/cryopreservation is a process that allows people to freeze and store the embryos for future use. In this procedure, eggs are collected from a woman’s ovary and fertilized with sperm in the laboratory to form embryos. The embryos are frozen and later can be thawed and placed in a woman’s uterus to facilitate conception. Embryo freezing is one of the types of fertility preservation.
In 1980, the first successful pregnancy happened through freezing a healthy embryo. Since then, people have started freezing their embryos and use them later.
Why Do People Freeze Embryos?
We know that women often freeze their eggs to fight against their ticking biological clocks and simplify their baby-making process in the future. Mand women equally may have both medical and social reasons to consider fertility preservation.
- It is a known fact that egg quantity and quality decrease as women age, especially after the age of 35. Utilizing frozen embryos, women can have healthy pregnancies later in life. Since the embryo possesses younger eggs, there is less risk of pregnancy complications.
- Another reason is, when a couple is having their first baby through IVF, they may decide to create multiple embryos in case there is any first cycle failure and these embryos would be used for later cycles. Couples feel it is a good option to save some extra embryos. Hence, embryo freezing is considered a crucial part of most IVF programs.
- It can give another chance for conceiving if the first IVF fails, the couple would not have to go through IVF again.
- Embryos can be used when the couples desire to have a second baby.
- If the female partner can save embryos before she undergoes treatments, such as for cancer that may minimize or eliminate her chances of getting pregnant.
- The frozen embryos can be saved and given to some infertile couples in a donor program.
- The embryos can be saved and donated for research purposes.
Procedure—How is Embryo Freezing/Cryopreservation Done?
Embryo freezing is a multi-step process.
Egg Retrieval—The process begins with ovulation stimulation, a woman needs to take hormonal medications/injections for eight to ten days, this allows multiple eggs to develop in her ovaries. Then the woman undergoes a short procedure to retrieve mature eggs.
Insemination— Embryos are the cornerstone of the pregnancy, in order to form them, the egg should be fertilized with the sperm, either from a male partner or a sperm donor. The insemination process happens in a petri dish. Embryologists usually allow the fertilized egg to develop for five to seven days till it reaches the blastocyst stage.
Genetic Testing—Couples can opt for PGD/PGS—Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis/ Screening to test for genetic abnormalities and to check for any genetic diseases. This could prevent transferring any genetic conditions or diseases to the future child.
Embryo Freezing—Embryos can be cryopreserved using two methods, one is slow freeing and the other is vitrification.
Slow Freezing—In the first method, the water from the cells is removed and cryoprotective agents are added slowly to the embryos to increase the strength. Later, the embryos are cooled for over 2 hours. Once frozen, the yare store in liquid nitrogen at a temperature of -196.1̊ Celsius.
Vitrification—-Whereas vitrification is a rapid freezing technique in which it uses higher concentrations of cryoprotective agents. Once embryos are frozen, they are quickly placed into liquid nitrogen to prevent cell damage. Embryos are frozen within one to six days after their formation.
Difference Between Egg Freezing & Embryo Freezing
The main difference between freezing eggs and freezing embryos is, the eggs are collected and frozen without fertilization. When freezing embryos, the intended female partner’s sperm or donor sperm must be needed for fertilization before freezing.
On the other hand, egg freezing doesn’t require sperm ( they will be fertilized once a couple undergoes IVF). Embryo freezing also lets you know how many eggs are healthy enough to survive the fertilization process.
Who Can Benefit?
It is a better option for people with:
- Genetic disorders that may affect reproduction
- People who’ll soon undergo treatments such as chemotherapy
- People who take a lot of medications that can affect fertility
- Same-sex couples who wish to have children with the help of donor embryos.
Is IVF Frozen Embryo Transfer (FET) Vs Fresh IVF—Which is Best?
While both facilitate conception, IVF FET- Frozen Embryo Transfers have more pregnancy success rates comparable to those quality embryo transfers after the fresh IVF cycles. According to a study, where were considered results of a thousand instances of embryo transfers involving both fresh and frozen embryos.
The researchers found no difference between the two kinds of embryos but the frozen embryo transfer is more effective, indicating FET might lead to a higher rate of pregnancy and also better yet healthy outcomes for both the women and baby.
Best Egg Freezing Center in Hyderabad
MotherToBe fertility Center in Hyderabad offers the best facilities for egg freezing, sperm freezing, and embryo freezing. State-of-art oocyte, embryo cryopreservation services at an affordable cost for tomorrow’s family planners.
At MotherToBe, Dr. Vyjayanthi specializes in embryo freezing and other fertility preservation techniques. She is a well-experienced fertility specialist and embryologist who has successfully performed FET procedures subsequent to both fresh and failed IVF cycles.
Dr. Vyjayanthi is also renowned for implementing safe yet cutting-edge procedures in IVF and other fertility treatments, which entail success.
Have more questions about embryo freezing and egg freezing? Want to know your family planning options? We are here to help.