| Introduction: Assisted reproductive technology is used routinely for treatment of infertile
spouses. Previous studies reported conflicting results regarding effect of progesterone rise at the
HCG injection day. The aim of current study is to evaluate the effects of mid cycle progesterone
levels in IUI cycles. Methods: In this analytical cross-sectional study, the outcome of treatment
in 200 IUI cycles were evaluated. Patients’ demographic findings, progesterone level at the day
of HCG injection, number of follicles >16 mm, endometrial thickness and clinical pregnancy
rate were recorded. For better evaluation, progesterone levels were divided to <0.5, 0.5-1.5 and
>1.5 ng/dl. Results: Patients’ mean age was 29.70±4.38 years. The progesterone levels of <0.5,
0.5-1.5 and >1.5 ng/dl was detected in 24.5%, 56% and 19.5% of patients, respectively. The
rate of clinical pregnancy was 27.5%. Cases with positive pregnancy had significantly lower
progesterone levels (0.88±0.31 vs.1.11±0.80, p=0.04). The highest pregnancy rate was in
progesterone levels 0.5-1.5 compared to levels <0.5 and >1.5 ng/dl (42% vs. 12.2% vs. 5.2%,
p<0.001). There was no significant correlation between progesterone levels with endometrial
thickness (r=-0.130, p=0.06) and number of follicles >16 mm(r=0.02, p=0.77). Conclusion: The
results of current study showed that the increase in progesterone levels at the day of HCG
injection accompanies with lower pregnancy rate. However, this increase has no correlation with
number of mature follicles and endometrial thickness. |