According to Dr. Hal Danzer, a reproductive endocrinologist with the Los Angeles Fertility Institute, egg donations initially started when couples turned to their female relatives for help with conceiving a child. Eventually, outsiders retained as egg donors became a better-known and successful procedure. It allows the offspring to share some genetic traits with their parents and allows women to bond during the pregnancy. As egg donation becomes more popular with infertile couples, so does the need for potential donors. While sperm donation seems to be more common than egg donation, the process for harvesting eggs is much more involved than for sperm.
Egg donations require a semi-surgical procedure that requires weeks of hormonal injections.
Ideal Donor eligibility requirements usually call for women between the ages of 21 and 35 with a clean medical history, free of inheritable and sexually transmitted diseases. Since donors must generally be younger women, college students are likely candidates. They also have the time to work it around their schedule for the hormone injections and procedure. That money could prove to be very attractive to students struggling to pay for tuition and other expenses. Kim said that while the money did come in handy, it was the personal satisfaction of helping the anonymous couple that made it much more worthwhile.