There are two major types of surrogacy:
1. Partial also known as traditional or straight surrogacy, in which the woman who becomes pregnant is both the genetic and the gestational mother of the child. It is the case when the surrogate agrees to donate her own egg and then carries the embryo, delivers a child, however she relinquishes the custody of the child to the commissioning parents.
2. Complete or full also known as host or gestational surrogacy, in which the pregnant woman makes no genetic contribution to the child; a woman only gestates a child conceived by commissioning parents and transferred into her body using, for example, IVF (in-vitro fertilization). The woman impregnated with the genetic material provided by an infertile couple or one partner of the infertile couple, carries an embryo, delivers a child and further relinquishes the custody of the child to the commissioning parents.
There is a tendency now to limit the term “surrogacy” to only mean gestational surrogacy, since in case of traditional surrogacy almost every country protects the interests of a surrogate as the genetic mother of the child.
Surrogate or surrogate mother or gestational mother is a woman impregnated with the embryo conceived by other persons, who carries the child, genetically not related to her, and relinquishes custody of the child she delivered to genetic parents.
Intended parents or commissioning parents or genetic parents is a couple, usually married and infertile, intending to have a child genetically related to both of them or at least one of them and, for this reason, providing their genetic material to be transferred into the body of the surrogate by means of IVF.