Education is as much about creating or signposting to high quality resources as it is about raising awareness of the donor conceived experience in the public domain. DCUK were part of the team who created the ‘Preparing Donors for Contact’ which will be available under our resources section soon.

DCUK plans to enrich the work of the Donor Conception Network and other fertility journey stakeholders and influencers to encourage openness and transparency by amplifying the voices of those affected by historical medical, legal and regulatory decisions ensuring that the retrospective agenda is not forgotten.

2023 was an extraordinary year for media enquiries due to the new ‘Open ID at 18’ cohort of donor conceived people who are affected by the 2005 law change. When donor conception is reported about, it is common for the donor conceived voice to not be included, the story to be sensationalist or even too light hearted. It is felt that the human interest element can be brought into a segment and story, but that the experience can be kept quite surface level and rarely allows for the complexity of the DC experience to breathe.

“Education” section in the DCUK Consultation

Education Recommendations

• Create Media guidelines document
• Produce a media strategy
• Increase media and social media presence
• Actively develop relationships with journalists, broadcasters and
  documentary makers
• Hold events or panel discussions with stakeholders to help inform them of
  our thoughts and feelings
• Learn and educate by:
• Creating high quality resources ourselves and in collaboration with others
• Knowledge sharing materials with and resources with international DC
  groups
• Create a ‘how to use commercial DNA sites for your search’ guide
• Create a guide on making contact
• Create guides for historical recipient parents, historical donors, others
  inter-generationally affected by DC practices
• Create content for clinics to share
• Create content for therapists and other mental health professionals to
  share
• Create a competency based accreditation course for mental health
  professionals
• Create training for fertility clinic staff
• Create a glossary of terms
• Write and publish books to tell the UK stories
• Educate Doctors and Health Care Professionals, by producing resources
  and influencing local BMA GP training
• HFEA are increasing the capacity and resilience of the OTR team. We
  would look to be involved in the OTR’s training.
• Encourage improved signposting online and within the sector
• Ensure HFEA and DCR team are signposting to us as a peer-led support
  option
• Initiate opportunities to speak at relevant events
• Educate the Donor Conceived UK community at events with guest
  speakers
• Design Publicity Campaign to align with the Donor Conception Awareness
  day 27th April

For press or media enquiries please contact: Info@donorconceiveduk.org.uk.

For further information on our future ambitions please download our consultation document.