ETHICS STANDARDS

Agency’s responsibility regarding Emotional Disclosure

I BACKGROUND

Egg Donor Agencies work with all types of personalities when it comes to both the donors and the intended parents. As most cycles are considered anonymous or, in some cases, “open” (with slight degrees of variation), there is limited information that an egg donor or a recipient parent has with regards to one another. The agency has a responsibility to reveal personality traits that may affect the decision of all parties to move forward with one another. This SEEDS Ethics Principle is intended to refer to the information agencies should be required to share regarding personality traits of either the egg donor or the intended parents.

Disclosure to egg donors or intended parents should be limited to information that allows all parties to make an honest, informed decision without revealing identifying information that would breech confidentiality. The goal of the SEEDS Ethics Standards for emotional disclosure is to honestly identify and share information that could have emotional long-term effects on either the egg donor or intended parent(s) going through the cycle, or the possible risk to the cycle or offspring as a result.

II STANDARD

Donors

Emotional Disclosure of information to egg donors regarding the intended parents during the matching process of the cycle should include non-identifying information that allows the egg donor to make an informed decision about the family she is donating to. For example, an egg donor should know if they are working with a single parent, a gay family, a heterosexual couple and/or the marital status.

She should be informed of the following:

• They are capable of supporting a family.
• Intent for future contact.
• That the agency, clinic and/or licensed psychologist feel they are emotionally prepared to move forward with this process.
• They have not shown signs of verbal abuse to the agency and/or their staff.
• There is no known criminal record of drug or physical abuse.
• There are no signs of instability or obvious mental illness present.

Intended Parents

Emotional Disclosure of Information to intended parents regarding the egg donors during the matching process of the cycle should include non-identifying information that allows the IP’s to make an informed decision about the egg donor they are using.

The IP’s should be informed of the following:

• Job, moves, school and/or other obligations that are causing stress and/or fear (i.e. loss of a job, failing a class, moving to another location, etc.).
• Donors perceived enthusiasm and/or response and understanding of questions, obligations and appointments (including promptness of returned phone calls/emails/texts, etc).
• Donor’s social support system.
• New relationship within the time-frame of being chosen.
• Donor’s empathetic response to the intended parents.
• They have not shown signs of verbal abuse to the agency and/or their staff.
• There is no known criminal record, drug or physical abuse.
• There are no signs of instability or obvious mental illness present. For the purposes of this standard, Emotional disclosure is considered to be all important non-identifying personal information that could be a deciding factor in the egg donor’s and/or intended parent(s) comfort level in moving forward with the cycle.