Women who put off pregnancy until late in life not only jeopardise their own chances of bearing children, but may place their daughter鈥檚 fertility at risk as well.
A new study found that the mothers of infertile women tended to be older and closer to menopause when their daughters were conceived compared with the mothers of women who became pregnant. And as women wait longer and longer to have children, the affects could increase dramatically.
鈥淚n one or two generations, we could have serious problems and it could start to accumulate; it could have an additive affect,鈥� warns Zsolt Nagy of Reproductive Biology Associates in Atlanta, Georgia, US.
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Nagy and colleagues examined 74 patients who were using IVF to treat infertility. Women who did not become pregnant were themselves conceived an average of 20 years before their mothers reached menopause, the team found.
Gene expression
However, women who did become pregnant through IVF had been conceived earlier on in their mothers鈥� reproductive lives 鈥� an average of 25 years before menopause.
Nagy suspects that eggs from older women may have impaired gene expression that goes unnoticed until their female offspring try to conceive. 鈥淎ll the genes are there,鈥� he says of the daughters鈥� infertile eggs, 鈥渂ut they aren鈥檛 functioning correctly.鈥�
He suggests it is 鈥渧ery likely鈥� that the findings apply to women generally and not just to women seeking treatment for infertility. Nagy presented his findings at the American Society for Reproductive Medicine conference in New Orleans, US, on Tuesday.
