Abstract
Research question
Is overnight transportation of ovarian tissue before cryopreservation in a centralized
cryobank from the FertiPROTEKT network feasible?
Design
Data from 1810 women with cryopreserved ovarian tissue after overnight transportation
from December 2000 to December 2017 were analysed with a focus on transportation,
tissue activity parameters and pregnancy, and delivery rates after transplantation.
Results
A total of 92.4% of tissue samples arrived at ideal temperatures of 2–8°C, 0.4% were
transported at temperatures lower than ideal and 6.4% were transported at temperatures
that were too high, generally due to mishandling of the inlayed cool packs of the
transportation boxes. In 62 women, 78 tissue transplantations were carried out. A
subgroup of 30 women who underwent a single orthotopic transplantation with fulfilled
criteria of a complete follow-up after transplantation until the end of study, a premature
ovarian insufficiency after gonadotoxic therapy as well as the absence of pelvic radiation,
was further analysed. In this group, transplantations into a peritoneal pocket accounted
for 90%. Transplants were still active at 1 year and above after transplantation in
93.3%. Pregnancy and delivery rates were 46.7% and 43.3%, respectively, with one ongoing
pregnancy at the end of the study.
Conclusions
Overnight transportation for central cryobanking is a feasible concept that results
in high reproducible success rates through standardized professional tissue freezing
and storage.
KEYWORDS
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Biography
Jana Liebenthron obtained her PhD at the University Clinic Bonn under the supervision of Professor Markus Montag. In 2014, she assumed the position of Director of the IVF-Lab and Cryobank for human gametes and ovarian tissue. She is an active executive board member of the network FertiProtekt, highly specialized for ovarian tissue-banking and supports national and international hospitals in this field of fertility preservation. She has managed the new department UniCareD at the University clinic Düsseldorf since January 2018.Key message
Ovarian tissue cryopreservation is gaining more acceptance in clinical practice as an established option for fertility protection. Nevertheless, as the techniques require high expertise for reproducible success rates, the concept of centralized cryobanking can be carried over by fertility preservation networks to allow optimal tissue freezing and storage for everyone.
Article info
Publication history
Published online: January 18, 2019
Accepted:
January 3,
2019
Received in revised form:
December 21,
2018
Received:
June 18,
2018
Declaration: One of the authors (MM) is CEO of a consultancy company that provides consultancy service for establishing ovarian cryobanking facilities. The other authors report no commercial or financial conflicts of interest.Identification
Copyright
© 2019 Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of Reproductive Healthcare Ltd.
