Infertility might no longer be inevitable for youth with cancer

Preventive removal of ovarian or testicular tissue are the techniques that allow patients to hope that one day they they can become parents. It is still necessary that doctors make it a priority!

Imagine being told you have cancer, and that by following the treatment you may become infertile. A degree of horror is added. Doctors do not always raise the issue of infertility with their young patients. If treatments against cancer such as chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery can affect the reproductive function, there are several techniques now that allow preserving fertility.

The problem is that these techniques are rarely offered to cancer patients such as children and teenagers, since the priority of doctors is, above all, to eradicate the disease. However, today the rate of long-term survival rate of pediatric cancer patients is 75% as opposed to 20% in the early 60's.

The issue is that no one is informing the child or the teenager, that he might have fertility issues in the future, and it’s only when he gets to the age of having babies that he discovers his infertility. The situation has changed since 2008: freezing of testicular and ovarian tissues has progressed in the context of a research protocol. But grafting techniques are still considered experimental due to the risk of reintroducing cancer cells during surgery.

Recently, a new drug called goserelin, was developed to protect the ovaries by shutting them down temporarily. In this clinical trial, women who were given goserelin injections along with the chemotherapy, had less ovarian failure and gave birth to more babies than the women receiving only chemotherapy.

Even if this treatment is not efficient enough, having secondary effects and not concerning the men yet, could lead to a solution in the future. The miracle solution does not yet exist but we must remain positive because research is rapidly advancing.

Since a real treatment does not yet exist, we can only recommend you to use Conceive Plus.

Check out other articles:

Infertility: is this cholesterol’s fault? Study shows promise of preserving fertility in boys with cancer