Fertility Counseling and Preservation for Breast Cancer Patients.

Abstract

Fertility preservation includes all the necessary steps that have to be taken in order to implement a woman's aim for preserving and enhancing her future chances of having her own biological offspring.There are two available choices for patients to maintain their fertility.The first category includes all the preventive methods following the principle of reduction of gonadotoxicity, in terms of using fewer toxic drugs to the ovaries and similarly milder radiation regimens. It also includes the administration of agents that would keep the ovaries suppressed, to minimize the harmful effects of systemic therapy on the oocytes.The second includes necessary artificial reproductive technology procedures for collecting and freezing either gametes (oocytes) or zygotes (embryos). This can be accomplished with immature oocyte pickup followed by in vitro maturation (IVM). Alternatively, mature oocytes can be collected after minimal ovarian stimulation with very small doses or no medication at all, or through a natural cycle.Beyond that, promising is the modern option of ovarian tissue cryopreservation for future transplantation, while the option of oocyte donation is actually an option for childbearing, not for fertility.