Pregnancy with donated eggs 'has risk'

Published on Tuesday 21 June 2005 12:53

WOMEN who become pregnant with donated eggs face an increased risk of high blood pressure and other complications, researchers warned today.

Scientists in South Korea studied 61 pregnancies achieved by egg donation and compared them with a similar number of others that followed conventional IVF treatment.

They found that early pregnancy losses occurred significantly more frequently among the egg recipients.

The most striking complication was pregnancy-induced hypertension (PIH), or high blood pressure, which occurred in 12.5 per cent of the donor egg group but only 3.7 per cent of the standard IVF group.

PIH can lead to a more serious condition called pre-eclampsia which may turn out to be life-threatening. Between 600 and 700 women and seven and 10 babies are killed by the condition in Britain each year.

In contrast, only a 2.2-fold increase was seen when eggs were donated by a sister.