For female students strapped for cash, egg donation may be a viable option

As college students’ expenses skyrocket, the need to work multiple or full-time jobs while attending school becomes a must for many who pick up the tab on school and weekend play.

Some may come across an ad reading, “Egg donors needed for $8,000.”

For some, this could be an exciting opportunity to get some extra cash and help another woman achieve pregnancy. For others who don’t consider all the details, it could lead to disaster.

The process involves obtaining an egg from the donor and placing it in the recipient’s uterus after it has been fertilized with the sperm of the recipient’s partner.

The matching process could take as short as one day or as long as one year, said Brigid Dowd, director of the Donor Egg Bank, Inc.

Once matched, the impregnation process usually takes approximately two months.

“It all depends on how synchronized the menstrual cycles of both the women are,” Dowd said.

The recipients are typically single or married women, age 50 years or younger, who are unable to conceive due to various reasons. Some of these reasons are genetic issues preventing them from using their own eggs, compromised egg quality due to prior ovarian surgery, premature menopause or ovarian failure.

For most egg donating companies, the cost of using donor eggs is usually over $12,000. This fee includes the $3,000 to $8,000 paid to donors along with all legal contracts, psychological evaluation and the genetic counselor fee. It usually also covers medical insurance for the egg donor.

The national average success rate in helping women get pregnant is about 55 percent, said Dowd. The success rates usually are dependant on the stimulation process in which the donator is given hormones to produce more eggs at a time for the recipient. The average amount ranges from 12 to 20 eggs, Dowd said.

Donators are required to take a combination of hormone shots and drugs for up to two weeks (depending on how the hormones affect the women) to stimulate egg production and suppress the normal ovulation cycle until doctors are prepared to retrieve them.

They are then monitored with ultrasound tests, which generally begin a week into the donation cycle to assess the development of the eggs.

When the eggs mature, doctors administer a hormone to trigger ovulation and the egg is then extracted using a minor surgical procedure to extract egg-containing fluid from the ovaries.

The egg retrieval process takes about 30 to 45 minutes and the use of general anesthesia is used to minimize discomfort or pain.

Egg donors are usually between 21 and 32 years old. Most are students in college or graduate school, while others are working professionals.

Compensation varies, depending on the egg donor company. Donor Egg Bank, Inc., located in Los Angeles on Wilshire Boulevard, usually pays within five business days from retrieval of the egg, Dowd said.

Women donors must be in good general health. They must also successfully complete a psychological evaluation and be a non-smoker with no history of drug use.

Egg donors have the option of remaining anonymous. However, anonymous donators are required to submit and undergo an extensive personal and family health profile, which is provided to prospective recipient couples.

The absolute need to maintain confidentiality is a very important issue that is covered prior to the actual process of donating.

According to Dowd, donors all sign agreements with the agency regarding privacy and confidentiality as far as posting personal information online, and there are policies in place stating donors cannot claim the baby once it is donated.

“It states something amongst the lines of ‘I as a donor will not come look for you and I as a recipient will not come look for you,’ ” Dowd said.

Additionally, since this is a medical issue, privacy is protected by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).

If the confidentiality is broken, “One on either side have legal rights because of the contracts,” Dowd said.

“The confidentiality was what really made the process of donating an egg a comfortable one,” said an anonymous donator. “The place I went to was so discreet. I was allowed to come in and out through a back door so that there was minimal publicity.”

“It really makes a difference where you decide to donate your egg. Some places gave me a negative outlook on it, because of the way the place looked and how the doctors would talk to you. It almost seemed as if they were withholding information about the process. But the place I decided to donate was actually a good, easy positive experience,” she added. “I was just doing it for the money so I didn’t want anyone to know about it, it really got me out of the hole of debt.”

She advised that it is extremely important to do your homework regarding egg donating prior to actually going through with the process. “The doctors are entitled to give you all the information you request, so ask all the questions you need.” 

Recipients can request specific characteristics in their egg donor such as hair  and eye color, blood type, ethnic or religious background, etc., based upon availability at the time of the matching process.

Due to religious, cultural, or minority issues, there are demands for certain type of egg donors that are hard to come by. Dowd explains recipients want to find a donor with very similar traits, physically and culturally. There is a limited number of Jewish donors, which leads to a high demand for them as well as Indian and Asian donors. Recently she explained there was a Christian, Korean woman who donated because she knew how hard it was for a Korean couple to find a donor as “A, a Christian and B, a Korean.”   

Popular risks are infections that are in part due from the retrieval process in which a needle extracts from your ovaries, Dowd said. The doctor will usually have the donor start taking antibiotics prior to the extraction process to minimize any infections. 

The most serious risk is ovarian hyper-stimulation syndrome, which seriously affects about 6 percent of women receiving the hormonal shots and drugs.

This takes place when 30 or more eggs start to develop at once and fluid leaks out of blood vessels, collecting in the abdomen, causing nausea, bloating and occasionally kidney failure, or even death.

Although people worry about their fertility after donating an egg, there has been no documentation in regards to donating an egg effecting fertility, Dowd said.

The New York State Department of Health’s website says questions regarding long-term impacts on donor fertility remain unanswered. 

“I was a little weary in the beginning but after speaking to the doctors and meeting the couple who I was donating for, I realized it was something not to worry about,” said a non-anonymous donator.