Maternal Intake of Sugar- and Artificially Sweetened Beverages and Outcomes of Assisted Reproduction: A Prospective Cohort Study.

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate whether maternal intake of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) and artificially sweetened beverages (ASB) affects medically assisted reproduction outcomes (MAR). DESIGN: Prospective cohort study. SETTINGS: Fertility centre at an academic hospital. POPULATION: This study includes 612 women who underwent 1572 MAR cycles, including 804 intrauterine insemination (IUI) cycles and 768 in vitro fertilisation (IVF) cycles. METHODS: A 131-item food frequency questionnaire assessed women's pretreatment SSB and ASB intake. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Live birth per treatment cycle was considered the primary outcome. Secondary outcomes included estradiol trigger levels, endometrial thickness, total oocyte yield, fertilisation, implantation, clinical pregnancy, and pregnancy loss probabilities. RESULTS: A total of 112 (18.3%) women did not consume SSB, and 171 (27.9%) did not consume ASB. SSB and ASB intake were unrelated to the likelihood of success in infertility treatment cycles. The adjusted predicted marginal probability (95% CI) of live birth among women in the lowest and highest category of intake of SSBs was 0.41 (0.32, 0.50) and 0.41 (0.34, 0.49) in couples undergoing IVF/ICSI and 0.10 (0.06, 0.17) and 0.11 (0.07, 0.17) in couples undergoing IUI. The corresponding results for the lowest and highest categories of intake of ASB and live birth were 0.40 (0.33, 0.48) and 0.41 (0.33, 0.49) for IVF/ICSI cycles and 0.09 (0.06, 0.15) and 0.08 (0.05, 0.13) for IUI cycles. There were inconsistent associations in secondary analyses focused on intakes of individual beverages. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest that, in couples seeking MAR, women's intake of SSB or ASB is unrelated to the likelihood of success in infertility treatment with IUI or IVF.