Egg freezing has become an increasingly popular way for women to preserve their future family building options, but many still struggle to move forward with the process.
Fertility experts and industry leaders think cost, uncertainty and timing challenges remain the biggest obstacles, they said last Wednesday during a panel hosted by Sunfish at its office in New York City.
Cost
Raghav Mishra, Sunfish’s vice president of product, said financial concerns are the primary reason many people delay family building. The average cost of egg freezing in the U.S. is about $15,000.
Mishra acknowledged that employer fertility benefits — such as those offered through companies like Progyny and Carrot Fertility — can help but noted that patients often still face significant out-of-pocket costs under these models.
“I know that well, because I helped build that product,” he said, referencing the four years he spent on Progyny’s product team.
As a direct-to-consumer platform, Sunfish’s current focus is on supporting patients regardless of whether they have employer-sponsored fertility benefits, Mishra said. He pointed out that Sunfish connects patients with financing options, grants and discounts that can offset some of the costs.
Uncertainty
One of the biggest challenges with egg freezing is that fertility is highly individualized, making outcomes difficult for clinicians to predict, noted Dr. Chelsea Canon, a reproductive endocrinologist at Reproductive Medicine Associates of New York.
Even among women of the same age with similar lifestyles and health histories, egg freezing outcomes can vary significantly, she said. Fertility is influenced by many factors, including ovarian reserve, egg quality, genetics and underlying medical conditions. As a result, no one can predict with certainty how many eggs will be retrieved in a cycle or what the likelihood of a future live birth will be.
This is why Sunfish designed its egg freezing program to reduce some of the financial risk associated with unpredictable outcomes, Mishra said. If a patient’s egg retrieval yields fewer eggs than projected by Sunfish’s clinical team, the startup covers the cost of a second retrieval cycle.
Timing Issues
Another fertility expert — Tiffany Hallgren Crook, CEO of TLC Infertility & Donor Services — pointed out that there is no perfect time to freeze eggs. Still, many people wait for ideal circumstances that never arrive.
She noted that earlier egg freezing generally leads to better outcomes because egg quality and quantity decline with age.
Also, earlier is better because unexpected medical events can occur. Hallgren shared that she was diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer at age 28 and needed to begin chemotherapy within days. Because she had already frozen her eggs, she was able to quickly move forward with this treatment knowing she had preserved an option for future family building.
Photo: Carlos Duarte, Getty Images
