Fresh or frozen donor eggs
Fresh does better in both national datasets. The market moved to frozen anyway.
Two independent US national datasets, both showing the same direction.
| Source and measure | Fresh donor eggs | Frozen donor eggs |
|---|---|---|
| Live birth per transfer, national data 2021 | 53.5% | 45.8% |
| Live birth per recipient cycle start, registry 2013 to 2015 | 51.1% | 39.7% |
An absolute difference of 7.7 percentage points in one dataset and 11.4 in the other.
Meanwhile the market went the other way. Fresh donor egg cycles fell from 10,954 in 2012 to 1,552 in 2021, while frozen donor egg and donated embryo cycles rose from 8,893 to 26,700. Frozen eggs are easier to ship, easier to schedule, and cheaper per unit.
The question that has not been answeredCost per cycle is lower with frozen donor eggs. Cost per live birth has not been established, and those are different numbers when the success rate differs by seven to eleven percentage points.
If a frozen donor egg cohort is proposed, it is fair to ask for the clinic's own live birth rate with frozen against fresh, and to do the arithmetic on cost per baby rather than cost per attempt.
If a frozen donor egg cohort is proposed, it is fair to ask for the clinic's own live birth rate with frozen against fresh, and to do the arithmetic on cost per baby rather than cost per attempt.
Frozen donor eggs are not a bad option. They are a somewhat less effective option that is presented as an equivalent one, and the gap has been measured twice.
Where this comes from:
96. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 2021 assisted reproductive technology fertility clinic and national summary report. Atlanta: US Department of Health and Human Services; 2023.
100. Kushnir VA, Darmon SK, Barad DH, Gleicher N. New national outcome data on fresh versus cryopreserved donor oocytes. J Ovarian Res. 2018;11(1):2.
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