Fertility Preservation for Women with Cancer: How Your Healthcare Team Can Help

Jamie Forward:

Kristin, can you introduce yourself and tell us about the role of a fertility preservation navigator?  

Kristin Smith:

My name is Kristin Smith. I’m the program manager for Fertility Preservation at Northwestern Medicine, and that basically means that it’s my job to see young, newly diagnosed oncology patients.  

Ensure that they have all the information they need or want to learn about how treatment can impact fertility. And then, what fertility preservation options exist for them. And then, I also help see them through that process because it can be very complicated. On the flipside, in survivorship, I also see patients in survivorship when they’re ready to discuss family building or just interested to know what their current fertility status is. So, helping them kind of explore what that looks like, getting them set up with the right doctors, and just making sure that these patients are empowered to have all the information that they need so that they’re able to make a decision for themselves.  

Jamie Forward:

So, is there a fertility preservation navigator at every institution? 

Kristin Smith:

There is not one at every single institution. But I can tell you that this is a field that’s growing significantly. So, within the Oncofertility Consortium scientific committees, we have our own patient navigator committee, and we’re now about 90 strong within this group.  

And we’re all over the world. So, we’re definitely seeing fertility preservation, as it should be, become a very important topic for our patients and our providers. And then, we’re also seeing some of those supports get instituted. Because we know that having a navigator can make a really big difference in whether or not someone’s able to access and learn about fertility preservation services at their cancer center.   

Jamie Forward:

Great. So, Kristin, what should patients expect during their referral process to a fertility specialist? 

Kristin Smith:

Well, I think there should be an introduction from oncology. So, oncologists have very well written guidelines from the American Society of Clinical Oncology, or ASCO, about the importance of fertility preservation for their patients. So, that’s where that introduction should start. And then, from there, if that institution is lucky enough to have a navigator, that navigator can really take over and sort of describe fertility preservation options to patients, and then most importantly, help a patient get through a barrier of getting to a fertility specialist. 

And so, that navigator really should have at their fingertips the referrals in place to be able to get patients seen quickly and the ability to help patients pay for some of these services through a variety of different financial organizations.   

Jamie Forward:

And do you have advice for how patients can stay involved in the decisions across both care teams? 

Kristin Smith:

Absolutely. I think it’s so important in the midst of an existential crisis when a patient’s already going through these life and death decisions to be able to also have a voice and a say in how their fertility is discussed and handled. And so, I would really encourage patients to utilize online resources that currently exist. Whether it’s through the Oncofertility Consortium, different empower networks like this one where you can learn about fertility and fertility preservation. And if your oncologist has not brought it up to you, then I would definitely encourage you to ask your oncologist. How does my treatment impact my fertility? 

What fertility options exist for me right now? And how can I get a referral to a fertility specialist? And really, that oncology provider, your oncology team should be able to help see you through some of those answers.