Fertility Research News: Cancer Chemotherapy Drug ABVD Could Improve Ovulation And Pregnancy Outcome In Women

Scientists at the University of Edinburgh have revealed that ABVD, a common drug used for chemotherapy treatment, has the potential to solve low fertility in women. Their research shows the role of the common cancer drug in triggering the development of new eggs.

The research highlights the possibility of reversing the clock and triggering the ovaries back into a pre-pubescent state, according to The Vanguard. ABVD is a combination of adriamycin, bleomycin, vinblastine, and dacarbazine and is used to treat Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Professor Evelyn Telfer, one of the researchers, clarified that the study was only conducted on a few patients. She stressed the consistency of their findings and the significance of the study. "We need to know more about how the ABVD drug combination acts on the ovaries and the implications of this," said Telfer.

Published online December 5 in the journal Human Reproduction, the study hypothesized an increased activity in stem cells caused by the ABVD cancer drug within the ovary to produce new follicles. Other cancer treatments were proven to be damaging on follicles.

Telfer told the Daily Telegraph that the stem cells are stimulated by the ABVD to produce eggs due to some kind of shock effect or perturbation triggered by the harshness of the cancer chemotherapy treatment. She added that the egg follicles split into two or more parts during treatment.

The fertility research focused on samples of ovarian tissue from women who had undergone ABVD chemo treatment. It compared these samples to ovarian tissue of a dozen of healthy women and those who had another type of chemotherapy.

The researchers found out that women who received ABVD had a much greater number of immature follicles than the healthy women and those who had a different type of chemotherapy. The researchers aim to conduct further studies on the effect of each of the four chemotherapy drugs separately. They want to have a better understanding of the mechanisms related to the increased number of follicles.