Counting Your Eggs: Can a New Test Predict Your Future Fertility? by Karen Barrow This article was published a year ago this spring.
Plan Ahead consists of a simple blood test -done by a doctor- on the third day of a woman’s period. The blood sample is then sent to a lab where particular hormone levels are measured and compared to levels in the average woman of the same age. This allows the lab to estimate the number of eggs left in a woman’s ovaries and predict her fertility for the next two years, claims Lifestyle Choices, the manufacturer of Plan Ahead.
Other “egg counters” only measure the amount of follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) in the bloodstream. This particular hormone drops off towards the end of a woman’s fertile years. However, Plan Ahead also tests for two other hormones, inhibin B and anti-mullerian hormone (AMH), which seem to decline earlier in a woman’s reproductive life, signaling the beginning of the end, so to speak.
“By combining the test on all three hormones, we are able to offer women the most accurate ovarian reserve hormone test available in the world today,” explains Ledger.
The Plan Ahead test can be purchased online and delivered from England where the test was developed. But not everyone is convinced that this is the correct way to gauge if you are to put off having children.
Taking into account male infertility as well, could make the test results unreliable in from a couple standpoint. Although the woman may test fine and then postpose trying to conceive, the male part of the couple needs to be tested for their fertility as well.
Licciardi worries about the false sense of security that Plan Ahead may give to a woman or a couple. “There are so many factors that need to be taken into consideration,” he says. For example, if the results of the test show that a 39-year-old woman will likely be fertile for the next two years, she may put off trying. “It’s still hard to get pregnant at age 41, no matter what,” says Licciardi.
Additionally, the hormones that the Plan Ahead test measures, inhibin B and AMH, have not yet been proven as an accurate measure of a woman’s future fertility, Licciardi adds. Regardless, all of the tests that Plan Ahead offers can be done by a fertility specialist. And if a woman does discover that her fertile days are numbered, a fertility specialist will be better able to advise her of her options.
Licciardi does say that the test could be used to estimate the time left for a woman’s eggs, but shouldn’t be used as an accurate time line.
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