How to choose the right sperm donor

 

Using a sperm donor to conceive a child is an excellent choice for many people including same-sex couples, single women, and couples where the male has low sperm count, poor sperm mobility, or related infertility issues.

But choosing this method of conception is only the first step. Another big decision is choosing the right donor. While prospective parents won’t meet their selected sperm donor in person, you can learn a great deal about the donor through our comprehensive donor profiles. These give you as much information as possible to help you select the best fit for your family.

While there are many criteria for choosing a donor, it’s impossible to say which is the most important because that is entirely up to you. In fact, there isn’t a wrong choice – and there are hundreds of quality donors to choose from – so our selection process allows you to decide what’s best for you.

Using the donor match tool and other resources

There are many ways to refine your search, and our detailed donor match tool   is a good place to begin. The tool gives you details about a donor’s age, racial and ethnic origin, health, education, career, and many other background details. The tool also helps you select for specific physical and genetic traits that will be passed on to your child. For example, you can choose a sperm donor with similar skin tone or ethnicity as you, or select by height, hair color, eye color, or many other features.

It’s natural and understandable that you might choose a donor that resembles you or your partner. However, it’s important to remember that even if you pick a donor that looks similar to you, it’s impossible to know for certain what the child will look like once they are fully grown.

Personality traits and other intangible donor characteristics

Of course, physical attributes aren’t the only important criteria when selecting a sperm donor. That’s why our staff makes it a priority to get to know each donor personally. This allows us to provide insightful staff impressions and better help us match you with the right donor from our sperm bank.

Each donor also writes an essay and answers questions about their personality, temperament, family history, and life experience. You can listen to audio interviews with them, see baby photos of donors, and access their Keirsey personality tests as well.

A good way to think about it is to consider the characteristics you’d like your child to have. These include physical as well as psychological traits. Things like their personality, sensitivity, sense of humor, talents, intelligence, and other intangibles.

You may find it helpful to discuss and consider exactly the traits you’re looking for before even going to our donor search tool. Doing so will help you refine your search from the beginning and give you more to go on other than the baby pictures (adorable as they are).

Free photo matching process

Our staff can further help you narrow down your donor choice using our free photo matching process. You simply send us a list of 2-6 of your favorite donors from our Donor List along with a few color photographs of the person you’d like your child to resemble. This could be yourself, your partner, spouse, or any other individual of your choosing.
Our staff will then compare your photos to recent adult photographs, not available to the public, of our donors to help you select the donor(s) who most resemble your photos.

Find a safe donor match using your distinct genetic profile

Seattle Sperm Bank is also proud to partner with GenePeeks to offer Matchright, an advanced genetic matching service that creates donor matches for a client’s unique genetic profile. Each client-donor match is evaluated for more than 500 serious genetic conditions that aren’t included in the standard sperm bank screening process. Please call to learn more about this program.

With hundreds of healthy, qualified donors to choose from we’re confident you’ll find the right match for you and your family. And if you have any questions about your search, our dedicated staff is always happy to answer questions. Good luck!