Atosiban interacts with growth hormones as adjuvants in frozen-thawed embryo transfer cycles

TL;DR

This study found that combining atosiban and growth hormone may improve pregnancy outcomes in frozen embryo transfers, but more research is needed.

Contribution

The novel finding is that atosiban's effect on pregnancy is significant only when combined with growth hormone in FET cycles.

Findings

Atosiban alone showed no significant effect on pregnancy outcomes.

When combined with growth hormone, atosiban increased clinical pregnancy rates by 32-35%.

The adjusted odds ratios suggest a beneficial interaction between atosiban and growth hormone.

Abstract

To investigate the interaction between atosiban and growth hormone (GH) as adjuvants in frozen-thawed embryo transfer (FET) cycles

A total of 11627 patients who underwent FET at Xiamen University Affiliated Chenggong Hospital between January 2018 to December 2022 were retrospectively analyzed. Among them, 482 patients received atosiban and 275 patients received GH. The interactions were estimated by comparing the odds ratio (OR) for pregnancy comparing patients with or without atosiban adjuvant in cohorts stratified according to the presence of GH use in either the overall cohort or a propensity score (PS) matched cohort. An interaction term (atosiban × GH) was introduced to a multivariate model to calculate the ratio of OR (ORR) adjusted for confounders.

For all patients receiving atosiban administration, no obvious effect on pregnancy was observed in comparison with either matched or unmatched controls. However, when the patients were stratified according to GH administration, atosiban showed a significant association with clinical pregnancy in comparison with either matched or unmatched controls among patients with GH treatment with rate ratios (RR) of 1.32 (95%CI: 1.05,1.67) and 1.35 (95%CI: 1,1.82), respectively. On the other hand, however, the association was absent among patients without GH treatment. The adjusted ORRs in both matched and unmatched cohorts were 2.44 (95%CI: 1.07,5.84) and 1.95 (95%CI: 1.05, 3.49) respectively.

The combination use of atosiban and GH in FET cycles is potentially beneficial to the pregnancy. However, indications for the use of atosiban and GH may need further assessment.

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