The number of women choosing to do so is growing quickly. In 2023, the last year for which there are records, about 40,000 women froze their eggs in the U.S., compared to about 29,000 the year before. Though it doesn’t guarantee pregnancy, thousands of babies have been born from eggs that were frozen. If you decide to freeze your eggs, you’ll have both options and decisions afterward.
How Long Will Frozen Eggs Last?
Not enough time has passed to know how long frozen eggs can last because the choice only became widely available in 2013. It’s possible they can last indefinitely, and how long they stay frozen doesn’t seem to affect the chance of an egg becoming fertilized. Babies have been born using eggs frozen 20 years before or more.
How Much Does It Cost to Store Eggs?
Storage fees for frozen eggs can range from a few hundred dollars to more than $1,000 a year, depending on how many eggs are stored, what part of the country you are in, and local costs of living. It’s typically an annual fee, but different facilities may offer different payment options.
What Should I Look for in an Egg Storage Facility?
Government guidelines for laboratories ensure safety and quality, called the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA). Most egg storage facilities have a specialist who oversees them, called an embryologist. They typically have round-the-clock monitoring and alarm systems to make sure the temperature is consistent and the equipment is functioning well.
What Determines if Frozen Eggs Lead to Pregnancy?
Whether or not you become pregnant when you use frozen eggs depends on a number of things, but age is a key element. The number and quality of eggs drop as a woman grows older, so your age when you freeze them plays an important role. Eggs from older women may not have all 23 pairs of chromosomes, which can lead to congenital (present at birth) disorders.
Freezing eggs before age 36 may be the best timing to maximize the chance of getting pregnant if and when you use them. Egg freezing after 40 is possible, but it may not be recommended since fewer eggs will be viable.
How Many Women Get Pregnant Using Frozen Eggs?
Considerations like how many eggs are stored and the number of attempts at fertilization make measuring the success of using frozen eggs complex. One study looked at women who had 20 or more eggs thawed and went through IVF. It found that 70% of the women under 38 years old had a baby using their eggs. Looking at ages including women over 40, 58% of them had a baby from stored eggs. How long the eggs had been frozen did not affect the percentage.
What Happens When I Decide to Use My Frozen Eggs?
There are a number of steps involved before they are transferred to your uterus. About 8 out of 10 eggs survive freezing and thawing, but not all will be candidates for fertilization, and not all fertilization attempts are successful. Still there are ways to improve the chances of becoming pregnant.
Your doctor will prescribe hormones to prepare your uterus for the transfer. Typically, it’s two to three weeks of hormone pills, followed by six days of injections. You’ll have blood tests and ultrasound imaging to check your hormone levels and the thickness of your uterine lining. When the test results show you’re ready, the lab will thaw several eggs, usually about six to eight. The eggs are checked to make sure they’re not damaged.
Thawing can make it more difficult to fertilize the eggs. Most fertility doctors use a procedure called intracytoplasmic sperm injection, or ICSI. A single sperm is placed directly into the center of an egg, which increases the chances of fertilization.
Over the next five or six days, the fertilized eggs (embryos) are carefully watched in the lab. Labs can do genetic testing at this stage to help detect problems and also lower the likelihood of a miscarriage. The chance of a defect does not appear to be higher for an egg that has been frozen than one that has not.
After checking that the embryo is healthy, your doctor will transfer it into your uterus.
What Choices Do I Have for Unused Eggs?
Not every woman will decide to use their stored eggs. If you reach a time when you feel you no longer need them for any reason, consider discussing it with a qualified counselor. They can help you process any emotional, physical, or financial concerns that you may have until you decide.
You have several choices:
- Donate to prospective parents.
- Donate for research and teaching.
- Disposition, or safely discarding the unused eggs.
Show Sources
Photo Credit: Science Photo Library/Getty Images
SOURCES:
Micah Hill, DO, President, Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology, Rockville, MD.
American Society for Reproductive Medicine: “Can I Freeze My Eggs to Use Later if I’m Not Sick?” “Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection(ICSI).”
Asian Bioethics Review: “Counseling Elective Egg Freezing Patients Considering Donation of Unused Surplus Frozen Eggs for Fertility Treatment.”
Australian Journal of General Practice: “Elective egg freezing: State of the ART.”
Canadian Medical Association Journal: “Social egg freezing: risk, benefits and other considerations.”
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services: “Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA).”
Cleveland Clinic: “IVF (In Vitro Fertilization).”
Johns Hopkins Medicine: “Freezing Eggs: Preserving Fertility for the Future.”
Journal of Assisted Reproduction and Genetics: “Elective oocyte cryopreservation for age-related fertility decline.”
Journal of Clinical Medicine: “Outcomes of Social Egg Freezing: A Cohort Study and a Comprehensive Literature Review.”
Journal of Reproductive Human Sciences: “Oocyte Cryopreservation - Current Scenario and Future Perspectives: A Narrative Review.”
LGTB Health: “Fertility Preservation Legislation in the United States: Potential Implications for Transgender Individuals.”
Mount Sinai Fertility: ”Pre-implantation Genetic Testing.”
Obstetrics & Gynecology: “Dietary Folate and Reproductive Success Among Women Undergoing Assisted Reproduction.”
National Infertility Association, Resolve: “Making Decisions About Remaining Embryos.”
National Library of Medicine: “Frozen Eggs and the Financialization of Fertility.”
Reproductive Medicine and Biology: “Embryologist staffing in assisted reproductive technology laboratories: An international comparative review.”
Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology: “SART National Summary Report: Preliminary Summary National Report for 2023,” “Final Summary National Report 2022.”
University of Utah: “Egg Freezing.”
NYU Langone Health: “Frozen Eggs More Efficient Option Than In Vitro Fertilization for Women Starting Families Later.”
