Egg and Sperm Donors Could Be Required to Share Their Medical Records

Since she was 13 years old, Laura High's hormones have been malfunctioning. Her doctors put her on birth control because of the hormonal issues she was having. She was gaining weight quickly and becoming anxious as she got older. High is a stand-up comedian in New York City.

It was difficult to get to the bottom of the problem since High only knows one of her parents. She has never met a sperm donor that she knows nothing about.

She went to an endocrinologist in her thirties to get her bloodwork done in an effort to shed some light on the matter. She received a phone call that will stay with her forever. They said that it looked like Laura had a mass at the bottom of her brain. The pea-sized structure at the brain's base that is responsible for making and secreting hormones was the cause of her tumors. I was insane. High is on medication to shrink the Tumor that was benign. She didn't know the medical history of her dad.

She found a cousin and three half-siblings of the same man through a direct-to-consumer DNA test. One of her half- sisters has very serious autoimmune diseases that are linked to hormones. High and her half-siblings have reached out to their biological father, even if he doesn't want to have a relationship with them, but he has never responded to their attempts to communicate.

The US doesn't regulate its fertility industry as much as other countries. The community of people who were born in the US through egg or sperm donation is calling for change.

Tiffany Gardner, an attorney in Atlanta and vice president of communications for the US Donor, said, "So many of us are sitting here looking at the changes happening in Europe and other parts of the world and the UK, and just wondering, when is this going to take hold in the US

It is important that the interests of donor-conceived people are considered. When a parent's medical background isn't known, the donor-conceived person is often the one most directly impacted, either by developing a condition that potentially could have been prevented with the right screening and the right information, or just not knowing a complete medical history of their family. It impacts us and our children as well.