Choosing a sperm donor is one of the most personal decisions you’ll ever make – yet it can also be one of the most difficult.
You are making a crucial decision – is this particular man, who was generous and selfless enough to donate his sperm, the right sperm donor to help me have a child?
And typically, you’re relying solely on a sperm donor’s profile to make this choice. In the UK, the law ensures anonymity between recipient and donor – so there are no photographs to help you decide.
When faced with such an enormous decision, you need every bit of advice you can get. Which is why at Manchester Fertility, our sperm donor profiles go the extra mile, beyond just the ‘basics’.
In our second blog focused on donor sperm treatments, we explain how we take away some of the uncertainly around sperm donor selection, so you can be completely confident in your choice of sperm donor:
Profile basics:All Manchester Fertility sperm donors include their essential characteristics on their profile – this includes ethnicity, height, hair and eye colour. These are the basic pieces of information that tell you initially whether this donor could be right for you.
Pen portrait:So you can get to ‘know’ your donor through his profile, all our sperm donors complete a pen portrait – this is a description of themselves, which they write, designed to give you an insight into their personality. You’ll find details such as their hobbies, their interests, even the type of thing they do for a living.
Personal goodwill message:All our sperm donors truly appreciate the difference their gift makes – they know donating their sperm can literally change someone’s life. So you’ll find in our sperm donor profiles a personal goodwill message. This is from the donor to you and to any child you may have with their help. The message may give you good wishes for your treatment, and hopes that it will work. Or the donor may talk about his hopes for the future of the child you have. Again, it is designed to give you additional information into the individual natures of each of our sperm donors, to help you decide who is right for you.
Knowledge of the donor himself:Do you know that our dedicated Donation Team get to know each of our sperm donors very well? Our team is the link between you and the donor. You will never meet him, and he will never know who you are. But our Donation Team support him face-to-face through his donation cycles, and so when it comes to donor matching, you can trust the suggested matches they put forward for you. We aim to offer you a choice of at least two matched sperm donors; based on the preferences you give us.
Screening:Our sperm donor screening isn’t just a matter of the donor completing a few tests. He has to tell us not only about his own medical history, but that of his family too, as far back as grandparents. His sperm is thoroughly tested according to national standards before it is released for your use. So you can be sure that the sperm we offer is safe for you to use, no matter which donor you choose.
If you have any questions about sperm donor selection, contact our Patient Advisors on 0161 300 2737. In our next blog, we’ll be talking about one of the most important aspects of using donor sperm to have a baby – the issue of how to tell a child about its biological origins.
Last updated: 20th January 2020
