{"paper_id":"035ff360-b071-47d9-b9bf-85fc7d1bbdf4","body_text":"Abstract\nPurpose: To analyze the effects of glucocorticoid treatment for patients with abnormal autoimmunity on IVF-ET outcomes, low-dose predonisolone or dexamethasone was administered in 51 IVF-ET cycles of 41 patients with positive antinuclear antibody (ANA), anti-DNA antibody, and/or lupus anticoagulant (LAC). Rates of clinical pregnancy and implantation in these patients were compared with those in 48 cycles without corticosteroid therapy. Autoantibody-negative patients were also treated with IVF-ET combined with (29 cycles) or without (57 cycles) glucocorticoid administration, and the pregnancy and implantation rates were investigated.\nResults: Without glucocorticoid treatment, the pregnancy rate per cycle and implantation rate per embryo in antibody-positive patients were 10.4 and 3.8%, respectively. Significant increases in pregnancy (35.3%) and implantation (13.2%) rates were observed with corticosteroid treatment. In antibody-negative patients, the rates of pregnancy and implantation showed no significant differences with versus without the glucocorticoid administration.\nConclusions: Our results indicate that because autoimmune abnormalities may be at least one cause of implantation failure following IVF-ET, the combined use of low-dose corticosteroid can be effective for autoantibody-positive women.\nSimilar content being viewed by others\nReferences\nLubbe WF, Bulter WS, Palmer SJ, Ligginns GC: Lupus anticoagulant in pregnancy. Br J Obstet Gynecol 1984;91:357–363\nLockwood CJ, Reece EA, Romero R, Hobbins JC: Antiphospholipid antibody and pregnancy wastage. Lancet 1986;2:742–743\nGleicher N, El-Roeiy A: The reproductive autoimmune failure syndrome. Am J Obstet Gynecol 1988;159:223–227\nTabibzadeh S: Cytokines and the hypothalamic-pituitary-ovarian-endometrial axis. 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