94% of researchers rate our articles as excellent or good
Learn more about the work of our research integrity team to safeguard the quality of each article we publish.
Find out more
ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Nutr.
Sec. Nutrition and Metabolism
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fnut.2025.1549525
This article is part of the Research Topic Preventative Medicine: Nutritional and Lifestyle Interventions for Healthy Ageing and Chronic Diseases View all 35 articles
Association between METS-IR and female infertility: a cross-sectional study of NHANES 2013-2018
Provisionally accepted- the Affiliated Guangdong Second Provincial General Hospital of Jinan University, Guangzhou, China
Obesity and metabolic syndrome are significant contributors to infertility in women and are closely associated with insulin resistance (IR). The metabolic score for insulin resistance (METS-IR) is a new, non-insulin-based fasting index used to measure IR.However, the potential of METS-IR as a predictive indicator of female infertility risk has not been established. This study aimed to explore the association between METS-IR and the risk of female infertility.This cross-sectional study used data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) from 2013 to 2018. We conducted multivariate logistic regression, restricted cubic spline (RCS), and threshold effect analyses to investigate the relationship between METS-IR and female infertility.According to the self-reported data, 188 (12.20%) participants were classified as infertile. A significantly higher proportion of participants with elevated METS-IR were found to have infertility. Multivariable logistic regression analysis revealed that METS-IR was significantly associated with increased risk of female infertility, irrespective of the independent variable analysis by continuous variables or tertiles in the fully adjusted model (Model 3, continuous variable: OR=1.02, 95% confidence interval (CI):1.01-1.04, p=0.005; tertile 3 vs. tertile 1: OR=2.00, 95% CI=1.21-3.28, p=0.0128, p for trend =0.0126). RCS analysis indicated a linear correlation between METS-IR and the risk of infertility (p=0.121), and threshold effect analysis further supported this linear association (p=0.136). Moreover, above the inflection point of 32.94, the risk of infertility significantly increased with increasing METS-IR level (p<0.0001).Our results suggest that high levels of the METS-IR index are positively associated with infertility among reproductive-aged females in the United States.
Keywords: Insulin Resistance, metabolic syndrome, Metabolic score for insulin resistance, Female infertility, NHANES
Received: 21 Dec 2024; Accepted: 17 Feb 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Li, Tan, OuYang, Hu, Bao, Gao and Hua. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
WenFeng Hua, the Affiliated Guangdong Second Provincial General Hospital of Jinan University, Guangzhou, China
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.