Serum Copper to Zinc Ratio and Risk of Endometriosis: Insights from a Case-Control Study

Yanping Liu, Guihong Cheng, Hong Li, Qingxia Meng
In: Research Square · 2024 · doi:10.21203/rs.3.rs-4511841/v1 · W4399907912
preprint OA: green CC0
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⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06+body, 2026-06-08 ⓘ

This case-control study found that infertile patients with endometriosis had lower serum zinc levels and a higher serum copper to zinc ratio compared to controls.

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⚙ AI-generated deep summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-09 ⓘ

This retrospective case-control study investigated whether serum copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), iron (Fe), magnesium (Mg), and especially the Cu/Zn ratio are associated with endometriosis risk among 568 infertile women diagnosed with endometriosis and 819 infertile controls with tubal or male factor infertility, using early follicular phase measurements of trace elements and baseline sex hormones. The endometriosis group had lower serum Zn and a higher Cu/Zn ratio than controls, and restricted cubic spline analyses showed a linear relationship between Zn levels and Cu/Zn ratio in relation to endometriosis risk; logistic regression indicated higher odds of endometriosis across increasing Cu/Zn quartiles after adjustment for age, BMI, and baseline hormones. A key limitation explicitly implied by the design is that this is a retrospective analysis in an infertile population undergoing IVF, which restricts causal inference and generalizability. This paper is centrally about endometriosis — it examines serum Zn and the Cu/Zn ratio as biomarkers associated with endometriosis risk in infertile women.

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endometriosis

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