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Updated: May 28, 2025

Evaluation of Hepatic Glucose Production in a Polycystic Ovary Syndrome Mouse Model
Published on: March 5, 2022
Association of Glycemic Index, Glycemic Load, and Carbohydrate Intake with Antral Follicle Counts Among Subfertile
Makiko Mitsunami1,2, Maryam Kazemi1, Amy R Nichols1,3
1Department of Nutrition, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, 677 Huntington Ave, Boston, MA 02446, USA.
Background/Objectives:
Few studies have investigated the association of dietary glycemic index (GI), glycemic load (GL), and carbohydrate intake with antral follicle count (AFC). This study aimed to investigate the association of total carbohydrate intake and carbohydrate quality, measured by dietary GI and GL, with ovarian reserve assessed by AFC.
Methods:
This study included 653 females from the Environment And Reproductive Health Study who completed AFC and food frequency questionnaire. Of these, 579 female individuals had a quantifiable AFC in both ovaries and were included in the primary analysis. We estimated average GI and GL for each participant from self-reported intakes of carbohydrate-containing foods and divided participants into tertiles. Poisson regression models were used to quantify the relations of GI, GL, carbohydrates, and AFC while adjusting for potential confounders.
Results:
Participants had a median age of 35 y. Compared to participants in the lowest tertile of dietary GI, those in the highest tertile had a 6.3% (0.6%, 12.3%) higher AFC (p, trend 0.03) after adjustment for potential confounders. Stratified analyses revealed that the association between GI and AFC was present only among participants who had not undergone infertility evaluations.
Conclusions:
A higher dietary GI was associated with a higher AFC. Subgroup analyses among individuals who had not had a diagnostic evaluation of infertility before joining the study suggest that high-glycemic carbohydrates may be related to PCOM.
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