AMH LEVEL (ANTI-MULERIAN HORMONE)

AMH LEVEL (ANTI-MULERIAN HORMONE) AND FERTILITY OF EGG DONOR

We know that we women are born with a finite number of eggs or predetermined potential. When a girl is born, she carries about one or two million eggs and as soon as she reaches puberty, that number drops down to 400,000. In the female of reproductive age those numbers continue to decline and by the time she is 30 years old, this number has declined by a whopping 90%!

When a woman hits menopause, she has less than 1,000 eggs, among those only few are capable of reproduction purposes. For the vast majority of women, their childbearing age is actually older than their chronological age and thus they are unable to have children with their own eggs. Eventually, they turn to egg donors to help them add to, or create, their family. Typically egg donors are medically tested with a blood test on days 2 or 3 of their menstrual cycle called FSH (follicle stimulating hormone).

This blood test combined with a vaginal ultrasound can predict the number of eggs that a potential egg donor could produce. These tests reach their highest reliability on days 2 or 3 of the menstrual cycle. However, there is a new test has been developed called AMH antimulerian hormone blood test. This test measures the amount of AMH (Anti-Mullerian hormone) in the blood of an egg donor. The Anti-Mullerian Hormone is a substance produced by the granulosa cells in ovarian follicles, which are special cells that surround each egg in the ovary of a woman. This test is actually a better predictor of a woman's ovarian reserve and it helps us select suitable egg donors who are able to produce good quality eggs.