Fertility
While a man’s sperm is produced all the time, a woman’s ovum cells are already in place before she is born. Over time, the number of these ovum cells decreases. While there are still hundreds of thousands of ova in the ovaries at the time a woman is born, at the start of puberty only about 20,000 remain.
Even in her most fertile years, a woman loses ovum cells every month due to her period. In addition, the quality of the ova “decreases” over time.
The desire to have a unplanned pregnancy is unfortunately fulfilled only for one in ten women in their early forties. After 45, pregnancies and childbirth are rare. Many women cannot fulfil their desire to have a child at the biologically optimal time, due to career or health reasons or because they do not have a suitable partner.
Treatment
Due to modern freezing techniques (“cryopreservation”) it is possible today to better exploit the female fertility reserves and to store unfertilised ova for a later planned pregnancy. The prerequisite for this is that the preservation takes place as early as possible - if possible in the mid-thirties or younger. This is supported by current medical data.
If the cryopreservation of ova is not performed for medical reasons, this is also known as “social freezing” - a trend that has increasingly gained importance in the last few years. The companies Apple and Facebook created a buzz in the year 2014 when they announced that they would pay for their female staff to have ova frozen.
There can also be medical reasons for fertility preservation. For example, if the woman’s fertility is expected to be impaired in the near future - through a medical procedure, an illness, chemotherapy, or radiotherapy (Fertiprotekt Link). In these cases, you may also contact us.
Fertility preservation is a good possibility for significantly increasing the chances of a healthy and successful pregnancy later on.
Facts and Process
In order to have the best possible chances of a later pregnancy with frozen ova, as many ova as possible should be frozen. Frequently, several treatment cycles are needed. A more accurate assessment is possible after the first treatment cycle.
The costs for fertility care in the sense of "social freezing" are usually not covered by health insurance companies.
In the case of a planned germ cell-damaging therapy, the costs are covered by statutory health insurance in accordance with the guidelines for the cryopreservation of egg or sperm cells or germ cell tissue.