Sperm bank
Encyclopedia
A sperm bank, semen bank or cryobank is a facility that collects and stores human sperm
mainly from sperm donor
s, primarily for the purpose of achieving pregnancies through third party reproduction
, notably by artificial insemination
. Sperm donated in this way is known as donor sperm.
The increasing range of services which is available through sperm banks nevertheless enables more and more people to have choices over the whole issue of reproduction. Women may choose to use an anonymous donor who will not be a part of family life, or they may choose known donors who may be contacted later in life by the donor children. Women may choose to use a surrogate to bear their children, using eggs provided by the woman and sperm from a donor. Sperm banks often provide services which enable a woman to have subsequent pregnancies by the same donor, but equally, women may choose to have children by a number of different donors. Sperm banks sometimes enable a woman to choose the sex of her child, enabling even greater control over the way families are planned. Sperm banks increasingly adopt a less formal approach to the provision of their services thereby enabling people to take a relaxed approach to their own individual requirements.
Men who choose to donate sperm through a sperm bank also have the security of knowing that they are helping women or childless couples to have children in circumstances where they, as the biological father, will not have any legal or other responsibility for the children produced from their sperm. Whether a donor is anonymous or not, this factor is important in allowing sperm banks to recruit sperm donors and to use their sperm to produce whatever number of pregnancies from each donor as are permitted where they operate, or alternatively, whatever number they decide.
However, in many parts of the world sperm banks are not allowed to be established or to operate. Sperm banks do not provide a cure for infertility in that it is the sperm donor who reproduces himself, not a partner of the recipient woman. Most societies are built upon the family model and sperm banks may be seen as a threat to this, particularly where a sperm bank makes its services available to unmarried women.
Where sperm banks are allowed to operate they are often controlled by local legislation which is primarily intended to protect the unborn child, but which may also provide a compromise between the conflicting views which surround their operation. A particular example of this is the control which is often placed on the number of children which a single donor may father and which may be designed to protect against consanguity: low limits are often provided which in reality appear more intended to placate those who would be opposed to sperm donors producing tens or scores of children as to provide a justifiable safeguard. However, such legislation usually cannot prevent a sperm bank from supplying donor sperm outside the jurisdiction in which they operate, and neither can it prevent sperm donors from donating elsewhere during their lives. There is an acute shortage of sperm donors in many parts of the world and there is obvious pressure from many quarters for donor sperm from those willing and able to provide it to be made available as safely and as freely as possible.
in liquid nitrogen
tanks. It has been proposed that there should be an upper limit on how long frozen sperm can be stored, however a baby has been conceived in the UK using sperm frozen for 21 years. Before freezing, sperm may be prepared so that it can be used for intra-cervical insemination (ICI), intrauterine insemination (IUI) or for IVF(or assisted reproduction) (ART
).
supplied by a sperm bank may be used where a woman's partner is infertile or where he carries genetic disease. Increasingly, donor sperm is used to achieve a pregnancy where a woman has no male partner, including among lesbian and bisexual mothers-to-be. Sperm from a sperm donor may also be used in surrogacy
arrangements and for creating embryos for embryo donation. Donor sperm may be supplied by the sperm bank directly to the recipient to enable a woman to perform her own artificial insemination
which can be carried out using a needle-less syringe or a cervical cap conception device
. The cervical cap conception device
allows the donor semen to be held in place close to the cervix for between six to eight hours to allow fertilization to take place. Alternatively, donor sperm can be supplied by a sperm bank through a registered medical practitioner who will perform an appropriate method of insemination or IVF treatment using the donor sperm in order for the woman to become pregnant.
From a medical perspective, a pregnancy achieved using donor sperm is no different from a pregnancy achieved using partner sperm, and it is also no different from a pregnancy achieved by sexual intercourse
.
Sperm banks may supply other sperm banks or a fertility clinic
with donor sperm to be used for achieving pregnancies. Sperm banks may also supply sperm for research or educational purposes.
In countries where sperm banks are allowed to operate, the sperm donor will not usually become the legal father of the children he produces as the result of the use of the sperm he donates, but he will be the 'biological father' of such children. In cases of surrogacy
involving embryo donation, a form of 'gestational surrogacy', the 'commissioning mother' or the 'commissioning parents' will not be biologically related to the child and may need to go through an adoption procedure.
As with other forms of third party reproduction
, the use of donor sperm from a sperm bank gives rise to a number of moral, legal and ethical issues.
Men may also use a sperm bank to store their own sperm for future use particularly where they anticipate traveling to a war zone or having to undergo chemotherapy
which might damage the testes.
Where the recipient woman has a partner she may prefer to use sperm from a donor whose physical features are similar to those of her partner. In many cases, the choice of a donor with the correct blood group will be paramount with particular considerations involving the use of sperm from donors with negative blood groups. If a surrogate is to be used, such as where the customer is not intending to carry the child, considerations about her blood group etc will also need to be taken into account.
Information made available by a sperm bank will usually include the race, height, weight, blood group, health and eye colour of the donor. Sometimes information about his age, family history and educational achievements will also be given. Some sperm banks make a 'personal profile' of a donor available and occasionally more information may be purchased about a donor, either in the form of a DVD or in written form. Catalogs usually state whether samples supplied in respect of a particular donor have already given rise to pregnancies, but this is not necessarily a guide to the fecundity of the sperm since a donor may not have been in the program long enough for any pregnancies to have been recorded.
If a woman intends to have more than one child, she may wish to have the additional child or children by the same donor. Sperm banks will usually advise whether sufficient stocks of sperm are available from a particular donor for subsequent pregnancies, and they normally have facilities available so that the woman may purchase and store additional vials from that donor on payment of an appropriate fee. These will be stored until required for subsequent pregnancies or they may be onsold if they become surplus to the woman's requirements.
The catalogue will also state whether samples of sperm are available for Intracervical Insemination ICI
, IUI Intrauterine Insemination)or IVF use. ICI
is for vaginal or cervical insemination and IUI are 'washed' samples prepared for intrauterine insemination where sperm is injected directly into the uterus. IVF treatment refers to 'in vitro' use, i.e. where fertilisation takes place outside the body, literally 'in glass', and therefore to treatments involving donor sperm where an egg is removed from the body and an embryo is created which is then re-inserted, or inserted, into a woman. The preparation for IUI is normally done by a gradient centrifugation where prostaglandins and bacteria is removed from the plasma. Sperm prepared for [IVF] use normally contains a smaller sample of highly concentrated sperm.
One of the processes used is the 'swim up' method, whereby a sperm extender is added to the donor's freshly ejaculated sperm and the test-tube is left to settle. After about half-an-hour, the lighter Y chromosome sperm will have swum to the top, leaving the heavier 'x' chromosome sperm at the bottom, thus allowing selection and storage according to gender.
The alternative process is the Percoll Method which is similar to the 'swim up' method but involves additionally the centrifuging of the sperm in a similar way to the washing of samples produced for IUI inseminations, or for IVF purposes.
Gender selection is not permitted in a number of countries, including the UK.
with new guidelines in effect May 25, 2005. There are also regulation in different states including New York and California. In the EU the sperm banks are regulated by the EU Tissue Directive
in effect April 7, 2006.
A sperm bank takes a number of steps to ensure the health and quality of the sperm which it supplies and it will inform customers of the checks which it undertakes, providing relevant information about individual donors. A sperm bank will usually guarantee the quality and number of motile sperm available in a sample after thawing. They will try to select men as donors who are particularly fertile and whose sperm will survive the freezing and thawing process. Samples are often sold as containing a particular number of motile sperm per millilitre, and different types of sample may be sold by a sperm bank for differing types of use, e.g. ICI
or IUI.
A sperm bank recruits donors via advertising, often in colleges and in local newspapers, and also via the internet. A donor must be a fit healthy male, normally between 18 to 45 years of age, who is willing to undergo frequent and rigorous testing and who is willing to donate his sperm so that it can be used to impregnate women who are unrelated to, and unknown by, him. The donor must agree to relinquish all legal rights to all children which result from his donations. Where a man donates his sperm to a sperm bank, he will usually not be regarded as the legal father of children which are produced from his donations. The donor must produce his sperm at the sperm bank thus enabling the identity of the donor, once proven, always to be ascertained, and also enabling fresh samples of sperm to be produced for immediate processing.
Sperm is produced by way of masturbation. The sperm will be checked to ensure its fecundity and also to ensure that motile sperm will survive the freezing process. If a man is accepted onto the sperm bank's program as a sperm donor, his sperm will be constantly monitored, the donor will be regularly checked for infectious diseaes, and samples of his blood will be taken at regular intervals. A sperm bank may provide a donor with dietary supplements containing herbal or mineral substances such as maca, zinc, vitamin E and argenine which are designed to improve the quality and quantity of the donor's semen, as well as reducing the refractory time (i.e. the time between viable ejaculations). All sperm is frozen in straws or vials and stored for a minimum of 6 months before being released for sale and use to ensure that the donor remains healthy.
Donors are subject to tests for infectious diseases such as human immunoviruses HIV
(HIV-1 and HIV-2), human T-cell lymphotropic viruses
(HTLV-1 and HTLV-2), syphilis
, chlamydia
, gonorrhea
, Hepatitis B virus
, Hepatitis C virus
, cytomegalovirus
(CMV), Trypanosoma cruzi
and Malaria
as well as hereditary diseases such as cystic fibrosis
, Sickle cell anemia, Familial Mediterranean fever
, Gaucher's disease
, Thalassaemia, Tay-Sachs disease
, Canavan's disease, Familial dysautonomia
, Congenital adrenal hyperplasia
Carnitine transporter deficiency and Karyotyping 46XY. Karyotyping is not a requirement in neither EU nor the U.S. but some sperm banks choose to test donors as an extra service to the customer.
A sperm donor may also be required to produce his medical records and those of his family, often for several generations. A sperm sample is usually tested micro-biologically at the sperm bank before it is prepared for freezing and subsequent use. A sperm donor's blood group may also be registered to ensure compatibility with the recipient.
Spermatozoon
A spermatozoon is a motile sperm cell, or moving form of the haploid cell that is the male gamete. A spermatozoon joins an ovum to form a zygote...
mainly from sperm donor
Sperm donation
Sperm donation is the provision by a man, , of his sperm, with the intention that it be used to impregnate a woman who is not usually the man's sexual partner, in order to produce a child....
s, primarily for the purpose of achieving pregnancies through third party reproduction
Third party reproduction
Third party reproduction refers to a process where another person provides sperm or eggs or where another woman provides her uterus so that a woman can have a child. Thus the reproductive process goes beyond the traditional father-mother model. However, the third party's involvement is limited to...
, notably by artificial insemination
Artificial insemination
Artificial insemination, or AI, is the process by which sperm is placed into the reproductive tract of a female for the purpose of impregnating the female by using means other than sexual intercourse or natural insemination...
. Sperm donated in this way is known as donor sperm.
General
The development of sperm banks, whilst considered by some to be controversial, has enabled people to have greater control over their reproductive lives. By providing sperm from donors who are checked and screened, thousands of women every year are able to bear their own children in circumstances where this might otherwise not be possible. Controversy stems from the fact that donors effectively father children for others, often in considerable numbers, and usually take no part in the upbringing of such children, and also from the fact that single women and coupled lesbians frequently use sperm banks in order to have their own biological children.The increasing range of services which is available through sperm banks nevertheless enables more and more people to have choices over the whole issue of reproduction. Women may choose to use an anonymous donor who will not be a part of family life, or they may choose known donors who may be contacted later in life by the donor children. Women may choose to use a surrogate to bear their children, using eggs provided by the woman and sperm from a donor. Sperm banks often provide services which enable a woman to have subsequent pregnancies by the same donor, but equally, women may choose to have children by a number of different donors. Sperm banks sometimes enable a woman to choose the sex of her child, enabling even greater control over the way families are planned. Sperm banks increasingly adopt a less formal approach to the provision of their services thereby enabling people to take a relaxed approach to their own individual requirements.
Men who choose to donate sperm through a sperm bank also have the security of knowing that they are helping women or childless couples to have children in circumstances where they, as the biological father, will not have any legal or other responsibility for the children produced from their sperm. Whether a donor is anonymous or not, this factor is important in allowing sperm banks to recruit sperm donors and to use their sperm to produce whatever number of pregnancies from each donor as are permitted where they operate, or alternatively, whatever number they decide.
However, in many parts of the world sperm banks are not allowed to be established or to operate. Sperm banks do not provide a cure for infertility in that it is the sperm donor who reproduces himself, not a partner of the recipient woman. Most societies are built upon the family model and sperm banks may be seen as a threat to this, particularly where a sperm bank makes its services available to unmarried women.
Where sperm banks are allowed to operate they are often controlled by local legislation which is primarily intended to protect the unborn child, but which may also provide a compromise between the conflicting views which surround their operation. A particular example of this is the control which is often placed on the number of children which a single donor may father and which may be designed to protect against consanguity: low limits are often provided which in reality appear more intended to placate those who would be opposed to sperm donors producing tens or scores of children as to provide a justifiable safeguard. However, such legislation usually cannot prevent a sperm bank from supplying donor sperm outside the jurisdiction in which they operate, and neither can it prevent sperm donors from donating elsewhere during their lives. There is an acute shortage of sperm donors in many parts of the world and there is obvious pressure from many quarters for donor sperm from those willing and able to provide it to be made available as safely and as freely as possible.
Storage
The sperm is stored in small vials or straws of holding between 0.4 and 1.0 ml and cryogenically preservedCryopreservation
Cryopreservation is a process where cells or whole tissues are preserved by cooling to low sub-zero temperatures, such as 77 K or −196 °C . At these low temperatures, any biological activity, including the biochemical reactions that would lead to cell death, is effectively stopped...
in liquid nitrogen
Liquid nitrogen
Liquid nitrogen is nitrogen in a liquid state at a very low temperature. It is produced industrially by fractional distillation of liquid air. Liquid nitrogen is a colourless clear liquid with density of 0.807 g/mL at its boiling point and a dielectric constant of 1.4...
tanks. It has been proposed that there should be an upper limit on how long frozen sperm can be stored, however a baby has been conceived in the UK using sperm frozen for 21 years. Before freezing, sperm may be prepared so that it can be used for intra-cervical insemination (ICI), intrauterine insemination (IUI) or for IVF(or assisted reproduction) (ART
ART
ART is a three-letter acronym that can mean:Medicine* The use of Antiretroviral drugs, in anti-retroviral therapy, for the treatment of HIV* Assisted reproductive technology* Androgen Replacement Therapy...
).
Use
SpermSperm
The term sperm is derived from the Greek word sperma and refers to the male reproductive cells. In the types of sexual reproduction known as anisogamy and oogamy, there is a marked difference in the size of the gametes with the smaller one being termed the "male" or sperm cell...
supplied by a sperm bank may be used where a woman's partner is infertile or where he carries genetic disease. Increasingly, donor sperm is used to achieve a pregnancy where a woman has no male partner, including among lesbian and bisexual mothers-to-be. Sperm from a sperm donor may also be used in surrogacy
Surrogacy
Surrogacy is an arrangement in which a woman carries and delivers a child for another couple or person. This woman may be the child's genetic mother , or she may carry the pregnancy to delivery after having an embryo, to which she has no genetic relationship whatsoever, transferred to her uterus...
arrangements and for creating embryos for embryo donation. Donor sperm may be supplied by the sperm bank directly to the recipient to enable a woman to perform her own artificial insemination
Artificial insemination
Artificial insemination, or AI, is the process by which sperm is placed into the reproductive tract of a female for the purpose of impregnating the female by using means other than sexual intercourse or natural insemination...
which can be carried out using a needle-less syringe or a cervical cap conception device
Conception device
A conception device is a medical device which is used to assist in the achievement of a pregnancy, often, but not always, by means other than sexual intercourse or NI...
. The cervical cap conception device
Conception device
A conception device is a medical device which is used to assist in the achievement of a pregnancy, often, but not always, by means other than sexual intercourse or NI...
allows the donor semen to be held in place close to the cervix for between six to eight hours to allow fertilization to take place. Alternatively, donor sperm can be supplied by a sperm bank through a registered medical practitioner who will perform an appropriate method of insemination or IVF treatment using the donor sperm in order for the woman to become pregnant.
From a medical perspective, a pregnancy achieved using donor sperm is no different from a pregnancy achieved using partner sperm, and it is also no different from a pregnancy achieved by sexual intercourse
Sexual intercourse
Sexual intercourse, also known as copulation or coitus, commonly refers to the act in which a male's penis enters a female's vagina for the purposes of sexual pleasure or reproduction. The entities may be of opposite sexes, or they may be hermaphroditic, as is the case with snails...
.
Sperm banks may supply other sperm banks or a fertility clinic
Fertility clinic
Fertility clinics are staffed medical clinics that assist couples, and sometimes individuals, who want to become parents but for medical reasons have been unable to achieve this goal via the natural course...
with donor sperm to be used for achieving pregnancies. Sperm banks may also supply sperm for research or educational purposes.
In countries where sperm banks are allowed to operate, the sperm donor will not usually become the legal father of the children he produces as the result of the use of the sperm he donates, but he will be the 'biological father' of such children. In cases of surrogacy
Surrogacy
Surrogacy is an arrangement in which a woman carries and delivers a child for another couple or person. This woman may be the child's genetic mother , or she may carry the pregnancy to delivery after having an embryo, to which she has no genetic relationship whatsoever, transferred to her uterus...
involving embryo donation, a form of 'gestational surrogacy', the 'commissioning mother' or the 'commissioning parents' will not be biologically related to the child and may need to go through an adoption procedure.
As with other forms of third party reproduction
Third party reproduction
Third party reproduction refers to a process where another person provides sperm or eggs or where another woman provides her uterus so that a woman can have a child. Thus the reproductive process goes beyond the traditional father-mother model. However, the third party's involvement is limited to...
, the use of donor sperm from a sperm bank gives rise to a number of moral, legal and ethical issues.
Men may also use a sperm bank to store their own sperm for future use particularly where they anticipate traveling to a war zone or having to undergo chemotherapy
Chemotherapy
Chemotherapy is the treatment of cancer with an antineoplastic drug or with a combination of such drugs into a standardized treatment regimen....
which might damage the testes.
Selection
Sperm banks make information available about the sperm donors whose donations they hold in the sperm bank to enable customers to select the donor whose sperm they wish to use. This information is often available by way of an on-line catalog. A sperm bank will also usually have facilities to help customers to make their choice and they will be able to advise on the suitablitity of donors for individual donors and their partners.Where the recipient woman has a partner she may prefer to use sperm from a donor whose physical features are similar to those of her partner. In many cases, the choice of a donor with the correct blood group will be paramount with particular considerations involving the use of sperm from donors with negative blood groups. If a surrogate is to be used, such as where the customer is not intending to carry the child, considerations about her blood group etc will also need to be taken into account.
Information made available by a sperm bank will usually include the race, height, weight, blood group, health and eye colour of the donor. Sometimes information about his age, family history and educational achievements will also be given. Some sperm banks make a 'personal profile' of a donor available and occasionally more information may be purchased about a donor, either in the form of a DVD or in written form. Catalogs usually state whether samples supplied in respect of a particular donor have already given rise to pregnancies, but this is not necessarily a guide to the fecundity of the sperm since a donor may not have been in the program long enough for any pregnancies to have been recorded.
If a woman intends to have more than one child, she may wish to have the additional child or children by the same donor. Sperm banks will usually advise whether sufficient stocks of sperm are available from a particular donor for subsequent pregnancies, and they normally have facilities available so that the woman may purchase and store additional vials from that donor on payment of an appropriate fee. These will be stored until required for subsequent pregnancies or they may be onsold if they become surplus to the woman's requirements.
The catalogue will also state whether samples of sperm are available for Intracervical Insemination ICI
ICI
ICI or Ici may mean:* ICI programming language, a computer programming language developed in 1992* Ici , an alternative weekly newspaper in Montreal, CanadaICI is also an abbreviation which may mean:...
, IUI Intrauterine Insemination)or IVF use. ICI
ICI
ICI or Ici may mean:* ICI programming language, a computer programming language developed in 1992* Ici , an alternative weekly newspaper in Montreal, CanadaICI is also an abbreviation which may mean:...
is for vaginal or cervical insemination and IUI are 'washed' samples prepared for intrauterine insemination where sperm is injected directly into the uterus. IVF treatment refers to 'in vitro' use, i.e. where fertilisation takes place outside the body, literally 'in glass', and therefore to treatments involving donor sperm where an egg is removed from the body and an embryo is created which is then re-inserted, or inserted, into a woman. The preparation for IUI is normally done by a gradient centrifugation where prostaglandins and bacteria is removed from the plasma. Sperm prepared for [IVF] use normally contains a smaller sample of highly concentrated sperm.
Gender selection
Some sperm banks enable recipients to choose the gender of their child. Although the methods used do not guarantee 100% success, the chances of being able to select the gender of a child are held to be considerably increased.One of the processes used is the 'swim up' method, whereby a sperm extender is added to the donor's freshly ejaculated sperm and the test-tube is left to settle. After about half-an-hour, the lighter Y chromosome sperm will have swum to the top, leaving the heavier 'x' chromosome sperm at the bottom, thus allowing selection and storage according to gender.
The alternative process is the Percoll Method which is similar to the 'swim up' method but involves additionally the centrifuging of the sperm in a similar way to the washing of samples produced for IUI inseminations, or for IVF purposes.
Gender selection is not permitted in a number of countries, including the UK.
Regulation
In the United States sperm banks are regulated by the FDAFood and Drug Administration
The Food and Drug Administration is an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, one of the United States federal executive departments...
with new guidelines in effect May 25, 2005. There are also regulation in different states including New York and California. In the EU the sperm banks are regulated by the EU Tissue Directive
EU Tissue Directive
The EU Tissue Directive sets standards of quality and safety for the donation, procurement, testing, processing, preservation, storage and distribution of human tissues and cells intended for human application. It was adopted by the European Parliament on 7 April 2004 and came into effect between...
in effect April 7, 2006.
Selection and screening of donors
Using anonymous donor sperm or sperm from a non-anonymous, also called known or identifiable sperm donor through a sperm bank is a safe and reliable method of achieving a pregnancy.A sperm bank takes a number of steps to ensure the health and quality of the sperm which it supplies and it will inform customers of the checks which it undertakes, providing relevant information about individual donors. A sperm bank will usually guarantee the quality and number of motile sperm available in a sample after thawing. They will try to select men as donors who are particularly fertile and whose sperm will survive the freezing and thawing process. Samples are often sold as containing a particular number of motile sperm per millilitre, and different types of sample may be sold by a sperm bank for differing types of use, e.g. ICI
ICI
ICI or Ici may mean:* ICI programming language, a computer programming language developed in 1992* Ici , an alternative weekly newspaper in Montreal, CanadaICI is also an abbreviation which may mean:...
or IUI.
A sperm bank recruits donors via advertising, often in colleges and in local newspapers, and also via the internet. A donor must be a fit healthy male, normally between 18 to 45 years of age, who is willing to undergo frequent and rigorous testing and who is willing to donate his sperm so that it can be used to impregnate women who are unrelated to, and unknown by, him. The donor must agree to relinquish all legal rights to all children which result from his donations. Where a man donates his sperm to a sperm bank, he will usually not be regarded as the legal father of children which are produced from his donations. The donor must produce his sperm at the sperm bank thus enabling the identity of the donor, once proven, always to be ascertained, and also enabling fresh samples of sperm to be produced for immediate processing.
Sperm is produced by way of masturbation. The sperm will be checked to ensure its fecundity and also to ensure that motile sperm will survive the freezing process. If a man is accepted onto the sperm bank's program as a sperm donor, his sperm will be constantly monitored, the donor will be regularly checked for infectious diseaes, and samples of his blood will be taken at regular intervals. A sperm bank may provide a donor with dietary supplements containing herbal or mineral substances such as maca, zinc, vitamin E and argenine which are designed to improve the quality and quantity of the donor's semen, as well as reducing the refractory time (i.e. the time between viable ejaculations). All sperm is frozen in straws or vials and stored for a minimum of 6 months before being released for sale and use to ensure that the donor remains healthy.
Donors are subject to tests for infectious diseases such as human immunoviruses HIV
HIV
Human immunodeficiency virus is a lentivirus that causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome , a condition in humans in which progressive failure of the immune system allows life-threatening opportunistic infections and cancers to thrive...
(HIV-1 and HIV-2), human T-cell lymphotropic viruses
Human T-lymphotropic virus
Human T-cell Lymphotropic Virus Type 1 , also called the Adult T-cell lymphoma virus type 1, a virus that has been seriously implicated in several kinds of diseases including HTLV-I-associated myelopathy, Strongyloides stercoralis hyper-infection, and a virus cancer link for leukemia...
(HTLV-1 and HTLV-2), syphilis
Syphilis
Syphilis is a sexually transmitted infection caused by the spirochete bacterium Treponema pallidum subspecies pallidum. The primary route of transmission is through sexual contact; however, it may also be transmitted from mother to fetus during pregnancy or at birth, resulting in congenital syphilis...
, chlamydia
Chlamydia (bacterium)
Chlamydia is a genus of bacteria that are obligate intracellular parasites. Chlamydia infections are the most common bacterial sexually transmitted infections in humans and are the leading cause of infectious blindness worldwide....
, gonorrhea
Gonorrhea
Gonorrhea is a common sexually transmitted infection caused by the bacterium Neisseria gonorrhoeae. The usual symptoms in men are burning with urination and penile discharge. Women, on the other hand, are asymptomatic half the time or have vaginal discharge and pelvic pain...
, Hepatitis B virus
Hepatitis B virus
Hepatitis B is an infectious illness caused by hepatitis B virus which infects the liver of hominoidea, including humans, and causes an inflammation called hepatitis. Originally known as "serum hepatitis", the disease has caused epidemics in parts of Asia and Africa, and it is endemic in China...
, Hepatitis C virus
Hepatitis C virus
Hepatitis C virus is a small , enveloped, positive-sense single-stranded RNA virus of the family Flaviviridae...
, cytomegalovirus
Cytomegalovirus
Cytomegalovirus is a viral genus of the viral group known as Herpesviridae or herpesviruses. It is typically abbreviated as CMV: The species that infects humans is commonly known as human CMV or human herpesvirus-5 , and is the most studied of all cytomegaloviruses...
(CMV), Trypanosoma cruzi
Trypanosoma cruzi
Trypanosoma cruzi is a species of parasitic euglenoid trypanosomes. This species causes the trypanosomiasis diseases in humans and animals in America...
and Malaria
Malaria
Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease of humans and other animals caused by eukaryotic protists of the genus Plasmodium. The disease results from the multiplication of Plasmodium parasites within red blood cells, causing symptoms that typically include fever and headache, in severe cases...
as well as hereditary diseases such as cystic fibrosis
Cystic fibrosis
Cystic fibrosis is a recessive genetic disease affecting most critically the lungs, and also the pancreas, liver, and intestine...
, Sickle cell anemia, Familial Mediterranean fever
Familial Mediterranean fever
Familial Mediterranean fever is a hereditary inflammatory disorder. FMF is an autoinflammatory disease caused by mutations in MEFV, a gene which encodes a 781–amino acid protein denoted pyrin....
, Gaucher's disease
Gaucher's disease
Gaucher's disease is a genetic disease in which a fatty substance accumulates in cells and certain organs.Gaucher's disease is the most common of the lysosomal storage diseases. It is caused by a hereditary deficiency of the enzyme glucosylceramidase. The enzyme acts on the fatty acid...
, Thalassaemia, Tay-Sachs disease
Tay-Sachs disease
Tay–Sachs disease is an autosomal recessive genetic disorder...
, Canavan's disease, Familial dysautonomia
Familial dysautonomia
Familial dysautonomia is a disorder of the autonomic nervous system which affects the development and survival of sensory, sympathetic and some parasympathetic neurons in the autonomic and sensory nervous system resulting in variable symptoms including: insensitivity to pain, inability to produce...
, Congenital adrenal hyperplasia
Congenital adrenal hyperplasia
Congenital adrenal hyperplasia refers to any of several autosomal recessive diseases resulting from mutations of genes for enzymes mediating the biochemical steps of production of cortisol from cholesterol by the adrenal glands ....
Carnitine transporter deficiency and Karyotyping 46XY. Karyotyping is not a requirement in neither EU nor the U.S. but some sperm banks choose to test donors as an extra service to the customer.
A sperm donor may also be required to produce his medical records and those of his family, often for several generations. A sperm sample is usually tested micro-biologically at the sperm bank before it is prepared for freezing and subsequent use. A sperm donor's blood group may also be registered to ensure compatibility with the recipient.
See also
- Artificial inseminationArtificial inseminationArtificial insemination, or AI, is the process by which sperm is placed into the reproductive tract of a female for the purpose of impregnating the female by using means other than sexual intercourse or natural insemination...
- Genetic counselingGenetic counselingGenetic counseling or traveling is the process by which patients or relatives, at risk of an inherited disorder, are advised of the consequences and nature of the disorder, the probability of developing or transmitting it, and the options open to them in management and family planning...
- InfertilityInfertilityInfertility primarily refers to the biological inability of a person to contribute to conception. Infertility may also refer to the state of a woman who is unable to carry a pregnancy to full term...
- SpermatozoonSpermatozoonA spermatozoon is a motile sperm cell, or moving form of the haploid cell that is the male gamete. A spermatozoon joins an ovum to form a zygote...
- SurrogacySurrogacySurrogacy is an arrangement in which a woman carries and delivers a child for another couple or person. This woman may be the child's genetic mother , or she may carry the pregnancy to delivery after having an embryo, to which she has no genetic relationship whatsoever, transferred to her uterus...
- Commercial surrogacy
- Sperm donationSperm donationSperm donation is the provision by a man, , of his sperm, with the intention that it be used to impregnate a woman who is not usually the man's sexual partner, in order to produce a child....
- Donor conceived peopleDonor conceived peopleA donor offspring, or donor conceived person, is conceived via the donation of sperm or ova , or both, either from two separate donors or from a couple...
- Gestational carrier
- Third party reproductionThird party reproductionThird party reproduction refers to a process where another person provides sperm or eggs or where another woman provides her uterus so that a woman can have a child. Thus the reproductive process goes beyond the traditional father-mother model. However, the third party's involvement is limited to...
- Assisted reproduction
- FetusFetusA fetus is a developing mammal or other viviparous vertebrate after the embryonic stage and before birth.In humans, the fetal stage of prenatal development starts at the beginning of the 11th week in gestational age, which is the 9th week after fertilization.-Etymology and spelling variations:The...
- Designer babies
- Conception deviceConception deviceA conception device is a medical device which is used to assist in the achievement of a pregnancy, often, but not always, by means other than sexual intercourse or NI...
- Accidental incestAccidental incestAccidental incest is incest that is committed by two partners who do not know they are biologically related. It can occur when two people who are unaware of their biological relationship become sexually intimate, or between siblings who share a room and partake in sexual exploration...
External links
- SpermCenter.com - A fee-based service listing of sperm donors from all US sperm banks.