Donor sperm and timing

[Bryterlayter1]

Hello!

I am hoping to start IVF soon with donor sperm (we're a same sex couple). The uk based banks have a real dearth of donors and we may need to order from a European bank.

Has anyone had any recent (COVID and post Brexit) experiences with time lines for ordering from clinics abroad?

Hi @Bryterlayter1 we ordered from the US and it’s pretty quick. We last ordered in August, so during Covid. I think it was less than two weeks from deciding for definite on the donor to it arriving, but to be sure I would give yourself a little longer. By far the longest process was actually picking one.

Word of warning, in the USA (well the clinic we used) they test for a lot of genetic issues and the vast majority of donors seem to be carriers, so they advise genetic testing. We did this with our donor before we ordered (given the disease he was a carrier for) and it added about six weeks.

@Shamoo Thanks for the advice, when you say they advise genetic testing, do you mean they advise that the prospective mother gets tested to ensure the donor and mother aren't carriers of the same disease marker?

Can I ask was the genetic testing mandatory before you could order?

Good that it only took 2 weeks. That is pretty quick all things considered.

Same as @shamoo, we used a US bank and it took a day or two to do the paper work, another couple of days for clinic approval, and then they shipped - all in about 2 weeks I think to arrive at the clinic from when we chose.
The donor we chose was also a carrier for a severe condition so we had me tested - took 4 weeks to come back and was very useful as it turned out I am a carrier for the same (milder) condition as another donor on our shortlist. We based our decision to spend the money and time on the testing in the ‘worst possible outcome’ and it felt worth it.

@Bryterlayter1 yes that’s right, they advise the prospective mother to check if she is also a carrier of the same thing. It was optional and we could have decided to sign a waiver form with some counselling, but we decided to test as he was a carrier for deafness.