Natural ways to improve eggs?

[JackiesHope]

I am wondering if there are natural ways to improve the quality of eggs?

* Eating organic foods without pesticide/chemical residues
* Eating vegetarian?
* Taking supplements/chinese herbs
* Drinking wheatgrass juice (I've read that farmers feed this grass to cows to improve fertility)

[Carole]

You are right that eating healthy supports good fertility, but there doesn't appear to be a magic diet that ensures fertility. I wrote an earlier post about diet and fertility http://fertilitylabinsider.com/2010/07/fertility-diet-can-nutrition-affect-fertility/. In that post, I review the Nurses Study, one of the , if not the, largest dietary and lifestyle study every performed enrolling thousands of nurses and asking yearly questions about diet, lifestyle, and incidence of health problems. The bottom line from the study was that a diet with more plant than animal protein, more slowly digested starches than simple sugars, more unsaturated rather than saturated fat and a small amount of whole dairy was consistent with healthy ovaries. Women who consumed this healthy diet were less likely to suffer from ovulatory infertility. Extremes in diet or fad diets were not advised. if you go 100% vegetarian, you can't just eat leafy greens, you must also eat good plant proteins to make sure you get all the amino acids you need. Reducing your exposure to pesticides and chemicals is always good, and some chemical residues found in plastics have been associated with poor egg quality. See my post on BPA and egg quality here http://fertilitylabinsider.com/2010/12/bisphenol-a-bpa-and-egg-quality/. I would be very careful with supplements and herbs because some of these are very powerful and may affect the hormonal regulation of your ovaries but not necessarily in a good way. DHEA is a androgen supplement that some older women have used and reported better ovarian function but this supplement is unproven and even if it was proven to work, we don't know which women may benefit, although clinical trials to study the effectiveness of DHEA supplementation are ongoing at some IVF programs. The wheat grass juice idea is very popular online but I couldn't find a single Pubmed peer-reviewed scientific article supporting the use of wheatgrass for fertility. But having worked with cattle in my graduate studies, I can tell you their digestive systems are VERY different from ours and their ability to digest wheatgrass and obtain useful benefit is likely very different from ours. Unless you have multiple stomachs and the special bacterial populations in your stomach to digest wheatgrass, i would avoid it. Some plants like clover have phytoestrogens whose estrogenic effects can actually cause abortions in cows if they eat too much clover. The best advice is to eat a normal healthy diet, get enough exercise to promote your overall health, avoid smoking, avoid using street drugs and avoid weight extremes. Talk to your doctor about any supplements you are taking because some can interfere with ovarian stimulation medications. Hope this helps.:)
Carole

[grits]

Thank you for the information, Carole. Do you have any strong feelings or research on antioxidant supplementation? I took a ton of antioxidants between my first and second cycle and had vastly improved results (50% fertilization with 50% of the fertilized to blast vs. 100% fertilization with 100% embryos to blast). But they are very expensive. I'm wondering if it was really the antioxidants and if I should continue?

[Carole]

Grits,
I honestly have no idea whether antioxidants helped improve your second cycle. I know that second cycles are often improved because the doc "learns" from the first cycle how you respond to ovarian stimulation medications and can adjust your meds to optimize your second cycle based on this information. When I did a PubMed search on the scientific literature on antioxidants and fertility, most of the research suggested that if anti-oxidants were helpful, it was helpful for improving sperm quality. There was little evidence in the literature suggesting that antioxidants were necessarily beneficial for the ovary but it is not well-studied. Best wishes for your next cycle. :)
Carole

[grits]

Thanks for the response. I guess I will continue them. They can't hurt and I think they do a heck of a job at keeping my skin wrinkle free! :)

[NYFamilyOfFiveRoses]

Carole,

Would you recommend that I take DHEA before I have pretesting done? I do not plan to do an ivf cycle at least until Summer 2012.

I am 38 years old now. I was told that if I take around 50 mg that it can only benefit me. Should DHEA only be taken if I can an okay by the RE when I am ready?

Thanks so much.

[Carole]

I know that some patients have had good experiences with DHEA but I wouldn't start any supplements without discussing with your doctor first. Also, production of supplements are not regulated by the FDA so the quality of a supplement can vary a lot from manufacturer to manufacturer and even between lots. Some DHEA supplements have been tested and discovered that they did not contain any active hormone. This NIH website has a very good overview of DHEA http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginfo/natural/331.html. You didn't ask about this but I wouldn't recommend waiting until 40 to start or expand your family if starting sooner is an option for you. Between 38 and 40, the average women experiences a sharp decline in natural fertility. Best wishes, Carole. :)

[lindi]

I just read something on Pubmed about women with PCOS where controlled release alpha lipoic acid improved insulin resistance (something which improved fertility in ALL pcos women, lean or not) so that is one special case where an antioxidant has beneficial reproductive qualities. It works on the mechanisms that have created the kooky hormone cycles in PCOS women - and in that way would improve not only the menstrual cycle but egg quality. But some company has the patent on controlled release ALA its not the same as the kind you buy at the health food store.

[Carole]

That's very interesting. Hopefully the company with the patent will investigate this effect and if confirmed, seek FDA approval for its use in PCOS patients.

[NYFamilyOfFiveRoses]

I know that some patients have had good experiences with DHEA but I wouldn't start any supplements without discussing with your doctor first. Also, production of supplements are not regulated by the FDA so the quality of a supplement can vary a lot from manufacturer to manufacturer and even between lots. Some DHEA supplements have been tested and discovered that they did not contain any active hormone. This NIH website has a very good overview of DHEA http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginfo/natural/331.html. You didn't ask about this but I wouldn't recommend waiting until 40 to start or expand your family if starting sooner is an option for you. Between 38 and 40, the average women experiences a sharp decline in natural fertility. Best wishes, Carole. :)

Thanks very much for the information! I have to wait until I am 39 because we will definately not have the $$ before then. There is just not a way. I was done at 3 children, but now that this is an option out there for GS, I want to give it a try.