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Millions of American women struggle with fertility, for a variety of reasons and *spoiler alert* polycystic ovary syndrome is high on the list. Here’s a look at how this condition can affect your ability to get pregnant.
Perhaps you’re reading this because you want to get pregnant and you’re wondering whether your polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) will stand in the way. Or, maybe you're struggling to get pregnant, without success, and you want to figure out what’s behind the problem.
Whatever brought you here, our goal is to shed some light on the connection between PCOS and female infertility, which affects nearly one in five women between the ages of 15 and 49 in the United States.
At Bay Area Physicians for Women’s Health, our team of board-certified OB/GYNs has considerable experience helping women with fertility issues, as well as gynecological issues like PCOS, and we understand how the two are connected.
PCOS 101
To understand how PCOS can affect your fertility, let’s look at what occurs when you have this condition, which is quite common, affecting one in 10 American women of childbearing age.
With PCOS you have a hormone imbalance in which your androgen levels are too high. This is problematic because androgens are associated with more male characteristics, and the higher levels of this hormone can lead to a number of different side effects that include:
- Irregular menstrual cycles and periods
- More acne
- Too much body hair, which affects 70% of women with PCOS
- Thinning scalp hair
- Weight gain
- Darkened skin
- Skin tags
The reason why this condition contains the term, “polycystic,” is that the excessive androgens lead to issues with ovulation. For example, your eggs may not develop properly or your ovaries might have difficulty releasing the eggs. As a result of these issues, cysts can form on your ovaries — the cysts are formed by egg and egg sacs that don’t release or form properly.
PCOS and your fertility
Since we just discussed that PCOS can directly impact your ovulation, it makes sense that it can also affect your fertility. In fact, PCOS is the most common driver of infertility in women.
Just because PCOS accounts for a large portion of female infertility cases, however, it doesn't mean that it's a foregone conclusion. Many women who have PCOS are able to have children, especially if the hormonal imbalance isn’t great.
As the levels of androgen increase, the odds of infertility rise in lockstep, but even in these cases, you have options.
For example, our frontline treatment for PCOS is through hormonal treatments, such as androgen-blocking medications or oral contraceptives, that can regulate your ovulation and your hormone levels.
If these hormone therapies don’t prove successful and you’re still unable to get pregnant, we can move to more aggressive solutions, such as in vitro fertilization (IVF). With IVF, your eggs are harvested from your ovaries and then fertilized outside your body and implanted back in your uterus. The beauty of IVF is that you can get around the ovulation issues that are associated with PCOS.
So, if you know you have PCOS and you’re struggling to get pregnant, there’s a good chance that the two might be connected. The best way to find out for sure is to come see us for a full evaluation of your reproductive health
To get started, we invite you to contact our office in Mobile, Alabama, to schedule an appointment.