Thyroid Dysfunction and Autoimmunity in Infertile Women

Kris Poppe, Daniel Glinoer, Andre Van Steirteghem, André Van Steirteghem, Herman Tournaye, Paul Devroey, Johan Schiettecatte, Brigitte Velkeniers
Thyroid : official journal of the American Thyroid Association · 2002 · vol. 12(11) , pp. 997–1001 · doi:10.1089/105072502320908330 · PMID:12490077 · W2171513288
article OA: closed CC0 ⤵ 21 in-corpus citations
View on OpenAlex View on PubMed View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-08 ⓘ

This study found that infertile women, particularly those with endometriosis, have a higher prevalence of thyroid autoimmunity and elevated TSH compared to fertile controls.

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

Abstract

A prospective study was undertaken in 438 women (ages, 32 +/- 5 years) with various causes of infertility, and in 100 age-matched (33 +/- 5 years) healthy parous controls with the aim of assessing the prevalence of autoimmune thyroid disease (AITD) and hitherto undisclosed alterations of thyroid function. Female origin of the infertility was diagnosed in 45% of the couples, with specific causes including endometriosis (11%), tubal disease (30%), and ovarian dysfunction (59%). Male infertility represented 38% and idiopathic infertility 17% of the couples. Overall, median thyrotropin (TSH) was significantly higher in patients with infertility compared to controls: 1.3 (0.9) versus 1.1 (0.8) mIU/L. Serum TSH above normal (>4.2 mIU/L) or suppressed TSH (<0.27 mIU/L) levels were not more prevalent in the infertile women than in controls. The prevalence of positive thyroid peroxidase antibody (TPO-Ab) was higher in all investigated women of infertile couples, compared to controls (14% vs. 8%), but the difference was not significant. However, in infertility of female origin, a significant higher prevalence of positive TPO-Ab was present, compared to controls: 18% versus 8%. Furthermore, among the female causes, the highest prevalence of positive antibodies was observed in women with endometriosis (29%). When thyroid antibodies were positive, both hypothyroidism and hyperthyroidism were more frequent in all women of infertile couples and in the women with a female infertility cause, compared to women in the same groups but without positive TPO-Ab. The present study shows that in infertile women, thyroid autoimmunity features are significantly more frequent than in healthy fertile controls and this was especially the case for the endometriosis subgroup.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

Condition tags

endometriosisinfertility

MeSH descriptors

Infertility, Female Thyroiditis, Autoimmune Adult Autoantibodies Autoantibodies Autoimmunity Case-Control Studies Endometriosis Endometriosis Endometriosis Endometriosis Female Humans Infertility, Female Infertility, Female Infertility, Female Iodide Peroxidase Iodide Peroxidase Prevalence Prospective Studies

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 (29)

Cited by (21)

Source provenance

europepmc
last seen: 2026-06-11T06:19:48.454388+00:00
openalex
last seen: 2026-06-10T17:14:06.276822+00:00
pubmed
last seen: 2026-05-13T22:13:01.552487+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK