Answer from: Patricio Calamera, MD, MSc, ObGyn
No not at all, this is an easy question with a short answer – not at all.
Answer from: Halyna Strelko, MD
Generally speaking yes, but it should be chronic stress because stress increases cortisol, increased cortisol decreases estrogens and the circle is closed. So, chronic stress really decreases the quantity and quality of oocytes but it should not be like one day of stress, it should be something long lasting. AMH level is influenced by body mass index BMI, day of cycle, it is right and that it is independent but high LH level also influences AMH level. Also may be different from cycle to cycle around 20-30% and also may be very different if women take contraceptive pills. May be also influenced by the pre-analytical part of blood preparation if this blood was frozen or for example, just opposites stay one half of the day and heat so, it may influence the final number which we will receive. That’s why AMH per se is necessary to control by other methods.
Answer from: Zita West
No. Because the thing is a lot of women will ask, so can my numbers go up or down and sadly yes, they can go down but even if they go up, they’ve not gone up a significant amount to make an improvement. I don’t think stress affects your egg reserves. I think that sometimes your thyroid being out of kilter can affect your egg reserves but on the whole notch. Again, it’s very important to ask that question to your mother about when she had her menopause because if she had a menopause early, the chances are that you’re likely to do as well, so if you had an egg reserve test done it could be low.
Answer from: Melina Stasinou, MD, MSc, PhD
There are different opinions regarding the impact of psychological distress to the ovarian reserve. In the past they thought that stress can make a difference to regular ovulation and can decrease the ovarian reserve as well. But there is recent research that says stress does not play a role anymore, it needs to be chronic stress (continued stress) and then perhaps can cause an impact to the hypothalamus hypothesis adrenal axis. So in that way it can damage the follicles in terms of the cellular basis and mitochondrial dis-functions, so think about oxidative stress. Only these types of stress can change the environment where the follicles are growing and can cause the dis-function of the mitochondrial inside the cells and can damage the follicles all together.
