Reduced treatment costs for egg-sharers

Our egg-sharing programme means you can receive our Egg Sharer IVF treatment package to significantly reduce the overall cost of your own treatment, whilst helping others through the donation of some of your eggs.

Fertility treatment often results in the production of more eggs than you need. These could be used to help another woman who needs donated eggs to conceive a child.

How does it work?

Bourn Hall was one of the first clinics to introduce an egg-sharing programme. Our scheme, available at our clinics in Cambridge, Norwich and Wickford, benefits both the sharer and the recipient; patients who need eggs have a shorter waiting time, and women sharing their eggs receive a heavily discounted IVF treatment package, or IVF with ICSI.  The table below shows what is included.

Egg Share Providers £1,500 package price
IVF or ICSI Embryo transfer
Drugs up to pregnancy test HFEA registration fee
All in-treatment laboratory tests and procedures First year storage
All monitoring and scanning costs Pregnancy urine test
Cyst aspiration (if required) Pregnancy ultrasound scan
Local anaesthetic or Intravenous sedation (for egg collection procedure only) Follow-up consultation (if taken within two months of treatment completion)
Egg collection Counselling
Medical and nursing care

If you are sharing your eggs, you will have ovarian stimulation treatment – a normal part of a cycle of IVF. After the eggs are collected, they’re shared between you and the egg-share recipient. The minimum number of eggs for sharing is usually eight.

Your eggs are inseminated with your partner’s sperm, while the eggs given to the recipient are inseminated with her partner’s sperm. Each couple will have their own embryos transferred in a carefully controlled process.

The priority is that you become pregnant, so if an insufficient number of eggs are collected, the egg share will not go ahead. Instead, you will keep all of your eggs and will still receive the Egg Sharer IVF cycle package.

Who needs donor eggs?

You will be helping women who need donated eggs who may have:

  • A premature menopause – this affects 1-2% of women under 40
  • Ovaries damaged by chemotherapy or radiotherapy treatment for cancer
  • Been born without functioning ovaries (e.g. Turner’s syndrome)
  • Ovaries resistant to stimulation by the pituitary hormones
  • A high risk of passing on genetic disorders to their offspring
  • Poorly functioning ovaries as they get older

Is it right for me?

Egg sharing is a way for you to have our standard IVF package and treatment at a heavily reduced price while also helping someone else whose only chance of achieving a family is with donated eggs.

To egg-share you must be a non-smoker aged between 18-34, with a body mass index (BMI) of less than 30. You will need to undergo screening tests to ensure that you are free of infections, diseases or genetic conditions that might be transmitted.

The process for sharing is the same as for anyone donating eggs.

What next? 

The first step is to talk to our egg-share co-ordinators who will advise you whether egg sharing is appropriate for you.

The next step will be to attend a consultation where we will ask you about your medical and family history, and perform a medical examination and blood tests. If you are eligible for egg sharing and you decide you wish to go ahead, you and your partner will receive free counselling and be able to discuss all the implications.

Our specialist egg share co-ordinators will be on hand to guide you through the whole process and advise you about your treatment at every step of the way.

You can schedule a call with our donor team at a time that suits you.

–––––––––––––

Even if you don’t need treatment, you can help others to complete their families by donating sperm or eggs via our Become a Donor programme.