Japan IVF Analysis: Can Advanced Maternal Age Affect the Baby?

As marriage and childbearing are increasingly delayed, more people planning for pregnancy have begun to pay attention to the issue of age. Especially after the age of 35, many women worry that egg quality may decline and even wonder whether it could affect the health of a future child.

Why Does a Woman’s Age Affect Fertility?

Women are born with a certain number of eggs already stored in their ovaries. As age increases, ovarian reserve gradually declines, and egg quality also changes. With increasing age, the likelihood of obtaining chromosomally normal embryos may decrease, so some women may experience difficulty conceiving, pregnancy loss, or an increased risk of miscarriage.

This does not mean that getting older will necessarily make natural pregnancy impossible, nor does it mean that children born to older women will necessarily have problems. Ovarian function and overall health vary from person to person. The factors that truly need to be considered include age, ovarian reserve, previous reproductive history, and test results.

Why Is Embryo Quality Receiving More Attention During Preconception Planning?

For people planning to have children, IVF is not simply a matter of “retrieving eggs and then transferring them.” After fertilization, the eggs must continue developing into blastocysts, and the number of embryos ultimately available for transfer often decreases along the way.

Therefore, when planning IVF in Japan, it is important to consider not only the number of eggs retrieved but also embryo development. For those planning IVF-PGT, PGT testing can be performed after embryos develop to the blastocyst stage to further assess genetic information such as chromosomal status, providing more information for embryo selection and transfer planning.

It is important to understand that the value of PGT lies in helping identify certain genetic and chromosomal information. It is not used to determine a child’s future intelligence, personality, or learning ability. A child’s development after birth is also influenced by many factors, including genetics, family environment, education, and social factors.

For those who do not currently have plans to have children but want to preserve future options, egg freezing is also a fertility preservation option worth understanding. It is important to note that egg freezing preserves the eggs available at that time and cannot pause a woman’s overall biological aging. Therefore, deciding when to freeze eggs is itself an important part of fertility planning.