Female Fertility Options

Our team works collaboratively with other providers and facilities to offer fertility preservation options for females who have started menstruating (having periods). We can explain your fertility preservation options, including potential risks, costs and likelihood of success, and connect you with knowledgeable specialists. We can also explain experimental options that may be available for young girls who have not started menstruating.

Additional discussion and further details of each option can be provided during fertility team consultation.

Medications

Some patients opt to use medications to try to protect the ovaries (and future eggs) from gonadotoxic treatment injury. The outcomes (return of menstrual periods and/or pregnancy after these treatments) are varied in medical literature.

Surgery

If a patient requires pelvic radiation during cancer therapy, surgery to move the ovaries away from the field of radiation (oophoropexy or ovarian transposition) may prove beneficial.

Oocyte Retrieval and Preservation

Our team works collaboratively with other providers and facilities to offer this fertility preservation option for females who have started menstruating (having periods). Stimulating the ovaries with hormonal medications to make a lot of eggs at one time, retrieving those eggs through an office-based procedure and freezing the eggs for future use is a strategy to help preserve young women’s fertility when ovaries are at risk of injury or early failure.

Excellent results in stimulating the ovaries and freezing the eggs in girls and young women have been reported. Potential disadvantages include cost and delaying treatment for up to 10-14 days to obtain the eggs. With oocyte preservation, the male partner can be identified at a later date.

Our team can provide an overview, including potential risks, costs and likelihood of success, and connect you with knowledgeable specialists for a more detailed discussion.

Embryo Preservation

This intervention may be applicable for patients who have already chosen a male partner. The patient receives hormones, which stimulate the ovaries to make numerous eggs at once. Those eggs are retrieved through an office-based procedure and fertilized with sperm, and the resulting embryos are frozen for later use.

Ovarian Tissue Cryopreservation (OTC)

Now considered an “established” fertility preservation method by the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, this is an option for females of any age. A partial or complete oophorectomy (removal of one ovary) is performed in the operating room. As one of the only programs in the Ohio with experience in OTC procedures, we are proud to provide this option for individuals and families seeking methods that could potentially preserve their options for future parenthood.