Disclosure issues and decisions of couples who conceived via donor insemination

Abstract

Disclosing the use of donor insemination (DI) to family, friends, and offspring poses a quandary for many DI patients. A cross-sectional survey was conducted to determine whether couples opted to share information about conception via donor sperm with their children, as well as the issues and concerns that arose for parents once infertility treatment was completed. Twenty-seven married heterosexual infertile husbands and wives who had used DI to conceive completed a follow-up questionnaire asking them about disclosure decisions as well as thoughts about DI as a reproductive option. Results revealed that nearly three-quarters of the sample had not disclosed to their child and did not plan to, although 85% had told at least one other person about conception via DI. With few exceptions, husbands and wives agreed about how to handle disclosure. Notably, 32% of the mothers reported not knowing when or how to disclose. However, the majority of couples were not offered psychological counseling prior or subsequent to DI. It is suggested that mental health professionals should be aware of the divergence of opinion between what they believe about the benefits of disclosure/counseling, the beliefs of infertile couples about disclosure and what is actually known about the benefits of full disclosure among all involved parties.

Socioemotional Development in Changing Families

“…Even in Sweden, where legislation giving donor offspring the right to obtain information about the donors' identity came into force in 1985, more than a decade later, only 11% of parents had informed their children of their donor conception . Investigations in the United States have produced comparable findings, with rates of disclosure to the children reported to range between 14% and 30% (Leiblum & Aviv, 1997;Nachtigall, Tschann, Szkupinski Quiroga, Pitcher, & Becker, 1997). When questioned about their reasons for secrecy, parents in the European Study of Assisted Reproduction Families reported concern that their children would be upset, shocked, and confused by the knowledge that their fathers or mothers were not genetically related to them (Cook, Golombok, Bish, & Murray,1995;Golombok et al, 1999).…”

Strategies to Personalize and to Depersonalize Donors When Telling about Genetic/Gestational Origins

“…In contrast to the majority attitude of heterosexual couples who favor not disclosing their conception by means of gamete donation to their children (Leiblum and Aviv 1997;Salter-Ling et al 2001;Scheib et al 2003;Lycett et al 2005;Burr and Reynolds 2008;Freeman et al 2009;Jadva et al 2009;Blake et al 2016), single mothers and lesbian couples, whose families differ from conventional families in that 'there is no father', particularly favor disclosing how they have been conceived to their children (Leiblum et al 1995;Brewaeys 2001;Vanfraussen et al 2001;Murray and Golombok 2005;Freeman et al 2009;Landau and Weissenberg 2010;Gross 2014 ).…”

To name or not to name? An overview of the social and ethical issues raised by removing anonymity from sperm donors

“…Furthermore, there is no evidence from studies conducted with parents of donor-conceived children that the removal of anonymity would make it any less likely that parents would tell their children of the circumstances of their conception. Research conducted before removal of anonymity suggests that most children are ignorant of their donor offspring status [22][23][24][25]. Other European studies revealed that most couples did not intend to tell their children of their DI origins [26][27][28].…”

“…More recently, Golombok et al [25], in a study of 94 families with children conceived by DI, found that only 8.6% of DI children had been informed about their genetic origins, compared with 50% of in vitro fertilization (IVF) parents and 95% of adoptive parents. At most, only basic donor information was deemed important (for example, ethnicity, hight, education and health information) [24,29].…”