Cancer : New procedure gives fertility hope

Young women with cancer are gaining hope from a new procedure in which tissue from patients’ ovaries can be implanted in their forearms to produce mature eggs.

While such procedures are still experimental, doctors in the US say having children shouldn’t be out of the question for such women.

‘‘With increasing success in the treatment of cancer of young individuals ... there will be more women who will be candidates for this than ever before,’’ said Dr William Keye, director of reproductive endocrinology at William Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak, Michigan, and president-elect of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine.

Candidates include women like Lindsay Nohr, 25, of New York City, who had her eggs frozen after tongue cancer diagnosed at 22 recurred last year.

‘‘Just to have something that adds hope ... is a light at the end of the tunnel,’’ Nohr said. ‘‘It’s something to fight for.’’

Nohr is forming an advocacy group for such women, called Fertile Hope, and expects to have a website operating next month at www.fertilehope.org.

Such groups are needed because some patients aren’t told beforehand that radiation and chemotherapy could make them sterile, and many doctors may not know about potential fertility-saving options, said Allison Rosen, a New York psychologist and executive director of the New York chapter of Resolve, an infertility support group.

Rosen had cervical cancer in her late 30s and breast cancer at 47, when treatment caused her to go through sudden early menopause.

While Rosen had already had children, she understands the need for younger women to have the same chance.

‘‘To compromise that is an extremely painful process,’’ she said.