Cancer and fertility: You have options
Men and women facing a cancer diagnosis have many concerns, and often their future fertility is one of them. Cancers of the reproductive organs can damage fertility. Additionally, life-saving chemotherapy and radiation for other forms of cancer can create life-long fertility challenges. If you’re concerned about cancer and fertility, there is good news: You have options.
Cancer and fertility preservation
If you’re about to start cancer treatment, you’ll likely place any immediate plans of building a family on hold. However, you don’t have to give up your dreams of future parenthood. Our Las Vegas fertility center provides fertility preservation services for both men and women thinking about cancer and fertility.
- Sperm freezing
- Egg freezing
- Embryo freezing, or “freeze-all” IVF
While our fertility center is not a sperm bank, we do provide services to male cancer patients seeking to preserve their fertility through sperm freezing and long-term storage.
In addition to coordinating sperm freezing, we also provide semen analysis to evaluate the quantity and quality of your sperm. This will allow you to set enough aside for future attempts at pregnancy through intrauterine insemination (IUI) or in vitro fertilization (IVF). We can safely store sperm for decades. As a result, it will be there for you whenever you’re ready to become a father.
For female cancer patients, egg freezing uses advanced cryopreservation techniques to preserve eggs until you’re ready to try for a pregnancy. Our doctors retrieve eggs through the IVF process, but we freeze them rather than fertilize them.
Your fertility specialist will provide a thorough evaluation of your fertility potential and carefully tailor your cycle to retrieve as many eggs as possible. When you’re ready to try for a baby, we can thaw your eggs and fertilize them to create embryos.
Embryo freezing is another option
Another option for men and women undergoing cancer treatment is a “freeze-all” IVF cycle. Our team will retrieve and fertilize eggs before freezing the resulting embryos.
Once you’re ready to grow your family, you can opt for a frozen embryo transfer. With this option, couples can focus on cancer treatment, knowing that their future child or children already have an excellent chance at life.
Cancer survivors can also opt for preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD), also known as preimplantation genetic testing for monogenic disorders (PGT-M) to screen their embryos for known genetic mutations.
Donor sperm, donor eggs and gestational surrogacy are other great options
If you did not preserve your sperm, eggs or embryos before beginning cancer treatment, there are still options to have a baby. Men and their partners can use donor sperm with IUI or IVF to welcome a baby. As for women, they can rely on an egg donor and in vitro fertilization to help them become a mother. Additionally, if you cannot carry a pregnancy for any reason, you can turn to a gestational surrogate to help you start or grow your family.
Take control of your fertility
Our entire team is here to support you at every step with compassionate, expert fertility care and treatment. To learn more about cancer and fertility, contact us to schedule a consultation at our Las Vegas fertility center.
