Cancer treatments, particularly chemotherapy, can leave women infertile, preventing them from having children later in life. For some, egg cell freezing offers a solution, allowing them to preserve their fertility. Now, a groundbreaking case has shown that it is possible for a woman to give birth using frozen immature eggs harvested five years ago.
A woman in her 30s, who had been diagnosed with breast cancer at age 29, gave birth to a healthy baby, Jules, at Antoine Béclère University Hospital in Clamart, near Paris. This remarkable birth is the first of its kind, made possible by a technique known as in vitro maturation (IVM).
When the woman was diagnosed with breast cancer, she was offered fertility counseling before starting chemotherapy. Doctors explained that many women undergoing cancer treatments would likely become infertile. To preserve her fertility, they harvested immature eggs from her ovaries before chemotherapy, matured them in the lab, and froze them using a process called vitrification, which involves quickly freezing the eggs in nitrogen.
After completing her chemotherapy and achieving remission, the woman faced difficulty conceiving. She turned to the hospital, where her frozen eggs were thawed, fertilized, and implanted into her uterus. Nine months later, she gave birth to her baby without complications.
While the option of freezing immature eggs has been available for years, this marks the first successful birth from such eggs. The IVM procedure, which allows eggs to mature in the lab, is considered a last resort for women who cannot undergo ovarian stimulation, a more common method for egg freezing. Typically, ovarian stimulation involves hormone treatments that take several weeks, but cancer patients often cannot afford the delay due to the urgency of their treatment. There were also concerns that ovarian stimulation might trigger the return of cancer.
Professor Michaël Grynberg, head of Reproductive Medicine and Fertility Preservation at the hospital, highlighted that IVM is especially useful for women who face cancer treatments. “IVM allows us to freeze eggs in situations where ovarian stimulation is not an option, and there is no risk of cancer recurrence from using these eggs,” he explained. Although eggs matured in the lab are generally of lower quality compared to those retrieved after ovarian stimulation, the birth of Jules proves that IVM can be a viable option for fertility preservation.
The medical team emphasized that fertility preservation should be a standard part of treatment plans for young cancer patients. This way, they can have the option of starting a family in the future.
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