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Ovarian reserve biomarker declines among women with increasing age
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Antral follicle count, or AFC, a biomarker of ovarian reserve, declines in women who are fertile and infertile with increasing age, although the decline is higher in women with infertility, study data show.
“We confirmed the prevailing assumption that women with low ovarian reserve are overrepresented within infertile populations, who exhibit a greater decline in AFC with aging compared with women without a history of infertility,” the researchers wrote. “In addition, subgroup analysis demonstrated that decline in AFC in the infertility group was steeper almost universally irrespective of the percentile AFC or cycle length.”
Stamatina Iliodromiti, PhD, MD, MRCOG, of the department of obstetrics and gynecology in the School of Medicine at the University of Glasgow in the United Kingdom, and colleagues evaluated 15,500 women aged 18 to 45 years from 13 fertility centers across Spain from 2013 to 2014. Participants were divided into two groups based on fertility: infertile (n = 9,778) or potential oocyte donors (n = 5,722).
Compared with the infertile group, the potential oocyte donor group had greater average AFC (P < .001), a difference that was maintained after adjustment for age. For any given age older than 25 years, AFC was substantially greater in the potential oocyte donor group compared with the infertile group.
Compared with the potential oocyte donor group, the infertile group had a substantially steeper decline of AFC with age.
From age 20 to 35 years, there is a greater prevalence of low ovarian reserve assessed with AFC among the infertile group compared with the potentially oocyte donor group.
“We conclude that AFC declines with advancing age in both potential oocyte donors and infertile women,” the researchers wrote. “The extent of the decline is substantially larger in infertile women, potentially reflecting that women with low ovarian reserve are overrepresented within the infertile population. We have generated age-related reference ranges of AFC for both populations that can be valuable tools in clinical settings and facilitate patient consultation.” – by Amber Cox
Disclosure: The researchers report no relevant financial disclosures.
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