Being an older mum sometimes means that your body has to work harder than if you were younger. You are more likely to develop a health condition and are more likely to need help to give birth. You’re also more likely to have pre-existing health conditions, such as high blood pressure or diabetes, especially if you’re overweight. But try to remember that most women will still have healthy pregnancies.
Dr Bernard Kassab, a gynecologist, specialized in gynecology, obstetrics and infertility, explains all what you need to know about pregnancy after 40.
If you’re married women, older than 40 years, wishing to have a baby, it is never too late…Dr Bernard Kassab explains: “You can conceive either naturally or by oocyte cryopreservation (your already frozen eggs) or by the intervention of assisted reproductive technology (ART) such as IVF.”
Conceive Naturally
Dr Kassab explains:” A women’s prime fertility time is between her late teens and her 20’s, and once you reach your mid 30’s, your ability to get pregnant starts to decline. Therefore, being pregnant at your 40’s is difficult but never impossible. So we can wait from 3 to 6months. If the pregnancy cannot be achieved, we will pass to the next step: fertility treatments.
Conceive By IVF
After 6 months of trying naturally (or possibly even sooner),IVF is a good thing to try and gives significantly higher success rates than trying naturally, Dr Kassab explains. After doing all necessarily tests, we can go through IVF.
if IVF is not successful after several cycles and egg quality is believed to be a likely cause,Dr Kassab will likely suggest using your frozen eggs( if you have gone through egg freezing during you early ages) and if not, we will go to an egg donor.
Conceive by oocyte cryopreservation or Egg Freezing
The first live birth from cryopreserved oocytes was recorded in 1986.If you are aiming to prolong, protect and secure your fertility,you can freez your eggs in your younger ages to be used later when needed.
Dr Kassab Said:” Egg freezing, or oocyte cryopreservation, is a process in which a woman’s eggs (oocytes) are extracted, frozen and stored as a method to preserve reproductive potential in women of reproductive age”
He added:” women who already had frozen eggs, can use it to achieve pregnancy”
If this process was not successful, we will go through our last solution:” Egg Donor”
Conceive with the help of an egg donor
Donor egg IVF is like traditional IVF, but instead of using your own eggs, high-quality eggs from a young, fertile donor are used instead. Dr kassab added:” The high success rate of donor egg IVF confirms that egg quality associated with age is the primary barrier to pregnancy in older women. If you are over 40, your chance of successful pregnancy is around 20% using your own eggs but it is much higher in IVF cycles using donor eggs”.
Conclusion
Last but not least, dr Kassab highly recommend you:” For the best chance of success at a live birth in the future, it is best to freeze your eggs before you are 36. If not, donor eggs is the only reasonable alternative for women who had failed multiple IVF cycles or poor quality eggs. To sum up, it is never too late: even if you’re 40 or older you always have the chance to get a baby.
