Fertility Preservation Study – Ages 1-17

STUDY BASICS

Will your daughter receive treatment for a medical condition that may result in her infertility, and you want to preserve her ovarian tissue to possibly allow her to have children in the future? Your daughter may be able to take part in a research study to develop techniques for long-term preservation of ovarian function through freezing of ovarian tissues.

STUDY PURPOSE

There is no standard method of preserving fertility in girls who have not undergone puberty (ability to ovulate an egg once every month and undergo regular menstrual cycles). The purpose of this study is to develop techniques for long-term preservation of ovarian function through cryopreservation (freezing) of ovarian tissue before undergoing therapies that are likely to cause infertility (e.g., chemotherapy, radiation, etc.). Researchers will store participants’ ovarian tissue to use as a possible resource to allow medical procedures to try to restore fertility in the future using experimental techniques currently under development. This study will also provide a portion of your child’s tissue for research to advance the understanding of 1) the best techniques for freezing ovarian tissue, and 2) methods of developing mature eggs from frozen ovarian tissues.

COULD THIS STUDY BE RIGHT FOR YOUR CHILD?

• Ages 1-17
• Will be having treatment for a medical condition which may result in her infertility (inability to become pregnant).

WHAT PARTICIPANTS CAN EXPECT

This study involves your daughter having a surgical procedure to remove her ovarian tissue. After the surgical procedure, there will be one post-operative checkup to make sure your daughter is healing as expected. You will be contacted every year by phone or mail to discuss your daughter’s status, and to answer questions about any future use of her frozen tissue and the possible outcomes of her fertility preservation treatment. Once your daughter turns 18, she will be asked to sign an additional consent form and can decide how she wants to use her ovarian tissue.