The luteinizing hormone beta-subunit exon 3 (Gly102Ser) gene mutation and ovarian responses to controlled ovarian hyperstimulation.

BACKGROUND: Despite extensive progress in IVF techniques, one of the most difficult problems is the variability in the response to controlled ovarian hyperstimulation (COH). Recent studies show the effects of individual genetic variability on COH outcome.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the correlation between LHβ G1502A polymorphisms in exon 3 of the LH gene and ovarian response to COH.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 220 women treated with a long protocol for ovarian stimulation were studied. Three genotypes of GG, GA and AA were detected by polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) analysis.

RESULTS: In total, 34 (17%) patients were poor responders, 154 (77%) were normal responders and 12 (6%) were hyper responders. The most frequent genotype was GA (55.5%) whereas 44.5% of patients showed GG genotype and there was no patient with AA genotype. In total 54.5% of normal responders, 61.8% of poor responders and 50% of hyper responders showed GA genotype.

CONCLUSION: Our results did not establish a significant relationship between this polymorphism and the ovarian response. Therefore it is still very difficult to use the genotype of patients for prediction of the ovarian response to stimulation.