Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs as a possible cause for reversible infertility

L L Mendonça, L L F Mendonça, M A Khamashta, Munther A. Khamashta, Catherine Nelson‐Piercy, C Nelson-Piercy, Beverley J. Hunt, B J Hunt, G R Hughes
Rheumatology (Oxford, England) · 2000 · vol. 39(8) , pp. 880–882 · doi:10.1093/rheumatology/39.8.880 · PMID:10952743 · W2123513105
Case report OA: bronze CC0 ⤵ 8 in-corpus citations
📄 Open PDF View on OpenAlex View on PubMed View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by gemini-2.5-flash-lite, 2026-06-12 ⓘ

Four women with arthritis who stopped long-term non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) use successfully conceived shortly thereafter, suggesting NSAIDs may cause reversible infertility.

One-sentence paraphrase of the abstract; not a substitute for reading it. No clinical advice. How this works

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To highlight the possible association between infertility and treatment with long-term non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAIDs). NSAIDs act mainly through the inhibition of cyclooxygenase, the enzyme that catalyses the synthesis of prostaglandins, which are essential mediators of ovulation, implantation and placentation of the conceptus. METHODS: Case reports of four women suffering from severe arthritis, on long-term NSAIDs and undergoing extensive investigation and treatment for infertility. RESULTS: During the last 2 yr, four out of five women with severe arthritis and difficulty conceiving were counselled to stop NSAIDs, and they successfully conceived shortly after the withdrawal of NSAIDs. CONCLUSION: NSAIDs, used largely for the treatment of rheumatological conditions, may be responsible for some cases of infertility.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

Condition tags

infertility

MeSH descriptors

Anti-Inflammatory Agents, Non-Steroidal Arthritis, Rheumatoid Diclofenac Infertility, Female Adult Anti-Inflammatory Agents, Non-Steroidal Arthritis, Rheumatoid Diclofenac Female Humans Infertility, Female

Citation neighborhood (2-hop)

Papers in the corpus that this work cites (lower rings, blue) and that cite this one (upper rings, green). Dot size scales with the paper's in-corpus citation count — bigger dot = more influential within the endo/adeno field. Click a dot to open that paper. Outer rings show 2-hop neighbours — papers reached through the immediate citers/citees. [ collapse to 1-hop ]

References (7)

Cited by (6)

Source provenance

openalex
last seen: 2026-05-11T05:53:22.067783+00:00
pubmed
last seen: 2026-10-08T20:59:30.381419+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK