Bioethics International’s Executive Director, Jennifer Miller, appeared on CBS2 (9/22) to discuss the ethics of ovarian transplants and childbearing age-limits with Dr. Holly Phillips.  To view the news segment video click here. 

NEW YORK (CBS)Many women who delay having children often find they’ve waited too long and can’t get pregnant.  But now there is a controversial medical breakthrough that could re-start the biological clock.

It could usher in a new generation of moms at age 40 — and beyond.

Stephanie Yarber is a thankful transplant recipient.  “Miracle, a blessing,” Yarber said. She didn’t receive a kidney or part of a liver. The 30-year-old was given … an ovary.

“It’s completely changed my life,” Yarber said. At just 13 Yarber says early menopause robbed her of the chance to ever have her own biological children.  “I had the hot flashes, the night sweats, the osteoporosis,” Yarber said.  Years later, after she married, Yarber and her new husband tried everything to have a family. And then she read about an unbelievable experimental new procedure called “the ovary transplant.”

“When I first heard about it, it was being done on sheep and it’s one of those things that make you go, maybe,” she said. But it turned out to be much more than a maybe.

“They sold their car so they could come up here and have this transplant,” Dr. Sherman Silber said. The transplant is the brain child of Dr. Roger Gosden, a New York reproductive biologist, and Silber, a Missouri infertility specialist. And until then the ovary transplant had only be done on animals. But Yarber was game and asked her twin to be the donor.  Similar to a skin graft, Dr. Silber removed a section of her sister’s ovary and placed it into Yarber where, just days later, it took hold and began to function so normally she started ovulating soon afterwards.

“It jump started my ovary,” Yarber said.

“We never thought that it would work so successfully,” Dr. Gosden added.  It worked so successfully that Yarber was finally able to get pregnant.  As amazing as it was for her the doctors say ovary transplants can do something even more amazing for women whose biological clocks have stopped.

“You could have children until you are 60,” medical ethicist Jennifer Miller said. By simply freezing a piece of your own ovary when you’re in your 20s or early 30s so it can be replanted later in life.
“Personally, I wouldn’t wait until I’m 50. I would like to see my child grow,” said Solang Grey of Prospect Heights, Brooklyn.

“It’s a good thing to know that one can have that option.”

“I think it’s what young women ought to do if they are career minded or don’t anticipate finding their permanent partner for life for some time,” Dr. Silber said.

But not everyone thinks it’s a great idea for the mother or child.

“Maybe you have 20 years; maybe you have 10 years that you’re going to leave potentially an orphan behind,” Miller said.

For now the ovary transplant is being performed on a case by case basis with some very happy results.

“I’ve always wanted children and now I’ve got two of the sweetest little girls and ready for another one,” Yarber said.

If you opt for a donor, like any other transplant, you must be a match. The cost of an ovary transplant is about $8,000.  

Reporting Dr. Holly Phillips