Becoming an egg donor in Florida

Women who want to become egg donors in Florida will find a uniquely clear-cut and well-defined legal environment defining their compensation and rights. Florida law is very specific that egg donors are entitled to "reasonable" compensation for their participation in the fertility process. An egg auction to the highest bidder would not be permitted, and payments are likely to be only an amount to make up for lost wages or the cost of travel to and from the fertility center. The donors of eggs and sperm, however, have no parental rights or responsibilities under Florida law.

With legal responsibilities clearly defined, much more attention can be paid to caring for the egg donor throughout the fertility cycle. After a match is found, the potential egg donor will be asked to use the Pill for several weeks in order to establish a "baseline" of ovarian activity. Once this baseline has been established, then she will be given injections at the clinic to ensure the ovaries are "quiet." This takes about another week. Once the surrogate mother is being prepared to receive the donated embryo, the egg donor is asked to herself injections of Lupron at home to stimulate maturation of multiple eggs. After about two weeks, and 36 hours or so before the eggs are harvested, she will give herself a "trigger shot" of a hormone called hCG to release the eggs from the follicles on which they have been maturing. The next day the egg donor reports to the assisted fertility center. She is given checks for sexually transmitted diseases, sedated, and the eggs are extracted through a hollow needle inserted through the wall of the vagina.

Each ovary is washed to make sure that all "ready" eggs are collected, and then the egg donor is sent to the recovery room. Most women suffer no pain after the procedure, and the sedatives administered during the procedure erase any memories of the event. In Florida, egg donors enter the egg donation process because they want to enable a couple - whom they likely will not even know - to have a child. Florida law ensures that egg donation is a noble contribution to couples desperately seeking to have a child - a truly good deed.