| Dear Editor,
Obesity and its related disorders are becoming a worldwide
public health concern contributing to increased morbidity and
mortality rates [1]. Obese women, in addition to their similar
comorbidities tomen, have fertility-related disorders, which is
a less emphasized aspect of obesity [2]. Hypotheses on association
between obesity and female infertility entered the
medical literature in the early twentieth century [3]. However,
recognition of this association dates back to the earlier centuries.
In a recent historical note, Levi ben Gershon (1288–1344
CE), a French rabbi, was suggested as the first to have described
the relation between obesity and female infertility [4].
Based on the historical evidence, we believe that the association
between obesity and female infertility was known to the
Greek and Persian physicians much earlier than thought.
Hippocrates (ca. 460–370 BCE) seems to be the first to
understand that obesity might lead to infertility [5]. Although
obesity and related complications were subjects of interest in
the Greek and Byzantine eras, the association between obesity
and female infertility was not clearly described in the medical
manuscripts of these periods [6, 7]. |