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Anonymous oocyte donation performed exclusively with embryos cryopreserved at the pronuclear stage
M A Damario1, D G Hammitt, T M Galanits
1Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota 55905, USA.
Objective:
To evaluate the clinical outcomes of patients who participated in an anonymous oocyte donation program that used embryos cryopreserved at the pronuclear stage.
Design:
Observational study.
Setting:
A tertiary care reproductive medicine unit.
Patient(S):
Anonymous oocyte donors and their respective recipients.
Intervention(S):
Oocyte donors underwent a standard controlled ovarian hyperstimulation protocol and transvaginal ultrasound-guided oocyte retrieval. Oocyte recipients underwent at least one programmed hormone replacement cycle with transcervical ET.
Main Outcome Measure(S):
Thaw survival, implantation, clinical and ongoing pregnancy rates.
Result(S):
Thirty-six oocyte retrievals resulted in one ET to date. The mean numbers of oocytes that were retrieved and normally fertilized were 18.2 and 11.6, respectively. Fifty-one embryo thaw-transfer cycles were performed, with an embryo thaw survival rate of 93.5%. The clinical and ongoing pregnancy rates per ET were 52.9% and 51%, respectively. The overall implantation rate was 28.7%. The percentage of oocyte retrievals that resulted in at least one ongoing pregnancy to date was 69.4%.
Conclusion(S):
Anonymous oocyte donation can be conducted efficiently with the exclusive use of embryos cryopreserved at the pronuclear stage. This approach facilitates synchronization of the donor-recipient pair, eliminates the risk that recipients will begin hormonal therapy without embryo availability, and produces an acceptable ongoing pregnancy rate per oocyte donation.