The role of the junctional zone in the management of adenomyosis with infertility

Sha Wang, Hua Duan
Frontiers in endocrinology · 2023 · vol. 14 , pp. 1246819 · doi:10.3389/fendo.2023.1246819 · PMID:37886646 · PMC10598341 · W4387498870
review OA: gold CC0 ⤵ 6 in-corpus citations
📄 Open PDF View on OpenAlex View on PubMed View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-07 ⓘ

This review explores the junctional zone's role in adenomyosis-related infertility, examining diagnosis and fertility-sparing treatment options for women desiring pregnancy.

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

⚙ AI-generated deep summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-07 ⓘ

This paper reviews evidence on how the junctional zone (JZ) of the myometrium contributes to adenomyosis-related infertility, with emphasis on diagnosis and conservative (uterus-preserving) approaches for women desiring pregnancy. Using a narrative search of PubMed and Google Scholar, it highlights that abnormal JZ widening and disruption are linked to endometrial invasion into the myometrium, and that increased JZ thickness on MRI is associated with poorer implantation and IVF outcomes, including reported associations with high implantation failure rates; it also summarizes findings that disordered JZ/peristaltic contractions may interfere with sperm transport and embryo implantation. The paper’s major caveat is that it is a literature search and synthesis rather than an original study, and it notes that there is no clear standard for average JZ thickness across studies. This paper is centrally about adenomyosis — it focuses on how junctional zone thickness and contraction patterns relate to adenomyosis-associated infertility and how imaging and fertility-preserving management may target the JZ.

Read from the paper's body, not the abstract. Not a substitute for reading the paper. No clinical advice. How this works

Abstract

The junctional zone (JZ) is an important structure in the myometrium that maintains uterine fertility. Changes in the junctional zone are closely related to infertility and adenomyosis (ADS). As an increasing number of young women are affected by ADS, the disease is no longer considered typical of women over 40. With these changes, an increasing number of patients refuse hysterectomy and desire fertility preservation treatment. At the same time, ADS is a crucial factor causing female infertility. Therefore, the treatment of ADS-related infertility and preservation of reproductive function is one of the other major challenges facing clinicians. For these young patients, preserving fertility and even promoting reproduction has become a new challenge. Therefore, we searched and summarized these studies on PubMed and Google Scholar using keywords such as "adenomyosis", "junctional zone", and "infertility" to explore infertility causes, diagnosis, and treatment of ADS patients who wish to preserve their uterus or fertility and become pregnant, focusing on the junctional zone, to obtain a full appreciation of the new perspective on this disease.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

Condition tags

adenomyosisinfertility

MeSH descriptors

Adenomyosis Adenomyosis Adenomyosis Adenomyosis Adenomyosis Adenomyosis Infertility Infertility Infertility Infertility Female Female Female Female Humans Humans Humans Humans Hysterectomy Hysterectomy

Citation neighborhood

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. [ expand to 2 hops ] — adds papers reached through this work's immediate citers/citees. Heavier; up to 60 extra dots.

References (83)

Cited by (7)

Source provenance

europepmc
last seen: 2026-06-13T17:20:28.795615+00:00
openalex
last seen: 2026-06-10T17:14:06.276822+00:00
pubmed
last seen: 2026-06-13T17:19:01.140397+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK