Rise in IVF Popularity Leaves Thousands of Babies in Limbo

More women are using donated eggs for in vitro fertilization (IVF) and more healthy babies are being born through the process, according to a study released last week, WORLD reports. While this is good news, the process also creates more embryos than can be implanted, leaving hundreds of thousands of frozen embryos in fertility clinics. For women with viable eggs who cannot become pregnant, IVF involves extracting their own eggs, fertilizing them and then re-implanting them in the uterus. Women who do not have viable eggs go through a similar IVF process using eggs from other women. The number of women who attempted IVF from another woman's eggs increased from 10,801 in 2000 to 18,306 in 2010. The percentage of healthy outcomes from donated eggs, defined as a baby born after 37 weeks weighing 5.5 pounds or more, increased from 18.5 percent in 2000 to 24.4 percent in 2010. The study, conducted by researchers at Emory University and published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, examined data from 443 fertility clinics in the United States. Researchers looked for trends in donor egg pregnancies and prenatal outcomes in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Assisted Reproductive Technology Surveillance System (NASS), which includes data from 95 percent of all IVF cycles in the nation.