Positive thinking can aid fertility, say scientists

A form of "talking therapy" has restored the fertility of women who would otherwise need drugs and hormone treatment to have a baby.

The scientists behind the research believe that psychological therapy that involves talking about a person's problems could help to boost the fertility of women who find it difficult to conceive as a result of the stress of modern life.

A study has shown that cognitive behavioural therapy - which emphasises the role of thinking about how a person feels - can significantly increase the chances of ovulation in a woman suffering from infertility.

The therapy involves identifying how negative thoughts affect someone and then looks at ways at tackling or challenging those thoughts in a positive and constructive manner.

The research was carried out on 16 women suffering from a condition called functional hypothalamic amenorrhoea, when women of normal weight have not had a menstrual period of six months or more.

Up to one in 10 women can suffer this extreme form of amenoorhoea but far more could be subfertile due the influence of stress, said Professor Sarah Berga of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia.

The condition is caused by a prolonged reduction in a hormone produced in the brain which should stimulate the release of further hormones into the bloodstream that trigger the ovaries to ovulate. The women also have high levels of the stress hormone cortisol.

"It's caused by a failure of the brain message to get to the ovary. It's as if the brain doesn't care," Professor Berga said.

Women living a stressful life tend to compensate by dieting or undertaking vigorous exercise, which can lead to loss of weight and anovulation - the failure to ovulate.

"Up till now it was thought that failure to ovulate was usually caused by the energy deficits induced by excessive exercise and, or under nutrition, but we asked why women undertake such behaviours," Professor Berga said.

"Often dieting and exercise are a way of coping with psychosocial stress, and our previous work had shown that such stress is often increased in women who do not ovulate," she said.

"We think there are women with sub-clinical forms of stress that appear to ovulate but do not get pregnant. It is possible that reducing stress could benefit them and it could also benefit men," Professor Berg said.

In a pilot study, the scientists divided 16 women with the functional hypothalamic amenorrhoea into two groups. One took part in cognitive behavioural therapy for 20 weeks while the other, untreated group were simply observed.

"A staggering 80 per cent of the women who received cognitive behavioural therapy started to ovulate again, as opposed to only 25 per cent of those randomised to observation", said Professor Berg.

"Neither group gained weight nor showed significant changes in their levels of leptin, a hormone involved in regulating body weight and metabolism.

Professor Berga said that the conventional treatment for the women who do not have periods is to given them oral contraceptives - if immediate conception is not required - or other hormones that can induce ovulation to they want to get pregnant.

The next stage is to repeat the experiment using a larger number of women. "If the larger scale study confirms our earlier results we will have very strong evidence for offering stress reduction as an effective therapy for a significant group of infertile women," Professor Berga said.

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