Egg freezing is one of the ground breaking fertility solutions in modern day motherhood. Basically, egg freezing is a process in which a woman’s egg is extracted, frozen and stored. Later, when she is ready to become pregnant, the eggs can be thawed, fertilized, and transferred to her uterus as an embryo which she can deliver like every normal baby.
A fertility specialist at the Bridge Clinic Dr. Emmanuel Owie explained the process saying:
“Tiwatope’s mother had her eggs frozen for two months, using the vitrification, also known as flash-freezing, process. This is the cutting edge technology in cryobiology, where the eggs or oocytes of a woman is dehydrated and the water content is replaced with ‘anti-freeze’ solution (cryoprotectants) before freezing. This will prevent the formation of ice crystals which could destroy the cell.
We fertilized the eggs using a standard technique known as intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) to overcome the egg shell which normally gets hardened with freezing. The fertilized egg was subsequently transferred into her womb, resulting in the pregnancy with Tiwa. She had her antenatal care in her family hospital and delivered the baby boy through Caesarian Section”
The Bridge clinic center hopes that this would profer an alternative for Nigerian women who travel to India and Europe to get their eggs freezed.
There are about 5000 babies who have been born from frozen eggs with a proven low risk of birth defects. Women freeze their eggs if they will undergo Chemotherapy or face radiation which usually causes infertility. Some others choose to do it for family planning reasons or when menopause is getting closer, or just for other personal reasons.
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