Aging
Navigate
Submit an Article
Research Paper|Volume 13, Issue 2|pp 1962—1971

Impact of metabolic syndrome on sex hormones and reproductive function: a meta-analysis of 2923 cases and 14062 controls

Lihong Zhou1, Liou Han2, Mingyao Liu3, Jixuan Lu1, Shangha Pan4
  • 1Department of Endocrinology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University, Harbin 150001, China
  • 2Department of General Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University, Harbin 150001, China
  • 3College of Life Science, Northeast Agricultural University, Harbin 150030, China
  • 4Central Laboratory, The First Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University, Harbin 150001, China
Received: May 6, 2020Accepted: October 5, 2020Published: December 1, 2020
https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.202160

Copyright: © 2021 Zhou et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Abstract

Current evidence is inconsistent regarding the impact of metabolic syndrome (MetS) on sex hormones and reproductive function, and this meta-analysis aimed to illuminate the association. A literature search was conducted in public databases to identify all relevant studies, and study-specific standardized mean differences (SMD) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) were pooled using a random-effects model. Finally, 21 studies were identified with a total of 2923 MetS cases and 14062 controls. In males, MetS cases had a lower level of testosterone, inhibin B, total sperm count, sperm concentration, sperm normal morphology, sperm total motility, sperm progressive motility and sperm vitality, and a higher level of DNA fragmentation and mitochondrial membrane potential. In females, MetS cases had a higher level of testosterone. No significant difference was detected for follicle-stimulating hormone, luteinizing hormone, oestradiol, prolactin, anti-Müllerian hormone and semen volume in males, and for oestradiol, follicle-stimulating hormone, luteinizing hormone and progesterone in females. In conclusion, this meta-analysis indicated the impact of MetS on sex hormones and reproductive function, and MetS cases had a potential risk of infertility.