All that you want to know about Surrogacy

by Samit Sekhar Co-owner @ Gurgaon Fertility Centre

Surrogacy explained in simple terms:

Surrogacy is an arrangement that is often supported by legal arrangements where a woman or the surrogate agrees to conceive for the other couple that is not able to produce a child. Surrogacy cost in India is comparatively lesser and hence the infertile couples all across the world come to India and seek the help of surrogacy experts.

Who all seek surrogacy arrangements?

Surrogacy is now legal in India and people seek this arrangement when pregnancy is not possible medically or when the pregnancy risk is too high for the intended mother or when the single man or woman desire to have a baby. It is one of the most successful assisted reproductive technologies.

In this type of arrangement, monetary compensation to the surrogate may or may not be there. When the surrogate mother receives money to render the womb, the arrangement is known as commercial surrogacy. In places like India where surrogacy is legal, the intended parents can seek the help of third-party agency for assisting in the process of finding surrogates and arranging surrogacy contract where they are screened medically and psychologically to ensure the best chances of delivery and gestation. However, most of the times, the couple choose one of their relatives who is already a mother to be a surrogate.

How surrogacy is performed?

There are two approaches to this medical procedure, traditional and gestational. These two different surrogacies can be differentiated in terms of the genetic origin of eggs and sperms. Gestational surrogacy is much more common than the traditional one and it is far less complicated legally also.

Traditional Surrogacy:

In this type of surrogacy which is also known as partial, straight and natural surrogacy. In this case, eggs of the gestational surrogate mother are used and the sperms of the commissioning father are used for producing a baby. Insemination of the surrogate can either occur through the artificial or the natural insemination. The child hence produced with this process relates to the surrogate mother genetically who is the biological mother.

Gestational Surrogacy:

This new method of surrogacy which is also known as full or host surrogacy is a newer technique with a high success rate. The process takes place when the embryo is created artificially with the help of in-vitro fertilization (IVF) technology and implanted in a surrogate mother who is a gestational carrier. This type of surrogacy has several forms and in each form of the gestational surrogacy, the child is related to the surrogate mother.

Here are a few forms of this type:

The embryo is created when the sperm of the intended father is fused with the intended mother’s ovum or eggs.

The embryo is created when the sperm of the intended father and an egg of a donor.
An embryo is produced using the eggs of the mother and sperms of the donor.
When donor embryo is transferred to the surrogate.

When you are opting for surrogacy and decide to have it in India, it is good to conduct some research work and get it done in the best IVF clinic in Gurgaon from a specialist.