Diminished Ovarian Reserve (DOR) is characterized by decreased female fertility, menstrual disorders and perimenopausal symptoms due to sex hormone deficiency or fluctuations. For now, there are no uniform diagnostic criteria or an ideal single detection index for DOR because of its insidious etiology and pathogenesis,theories suggest that there are specific changes in the body surface or acupuncture points in a pathological state. By detecting the biological characteristics of relevant meridian points and exploring the specificity and regularity of it.
There will be a multi-center, case-control, observational experiment. 50 patients with DOR and 50 healthy participants will be involved from Third Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang Chinese Medicine University, Hangzhou TCM Hospital Affiliated to Zhejiang Chinese Medicine University and social recruitment. Modern instruments are used to regularly test the pain threshold, infrared thermal image, resistance, micro-circulation, and biological ultra-weak luminescence. There will be no randomized methods and blindness for subjects, while assessors and statisticians are masked from patients or healthy people. The study is aim to explore the the relevance between meridian acupoints and DOR.
Study Type
OBSERVATIONAL
Enrollment
100
the Third affiliated hospital of Zhejiang Chinese Medical university
Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China
RECRUITINGTemperature of acupoint by infrared thermal image
Infrared thermography (The NEC R550 infrared thermal imager and the InfRec Analyzer NS9500 computer software) will be used to measured the temperature of the meridian acupoints. The measurements are taken at participants' follicular phase.
Time frame: baseline
Pain threshold
Pain threshold of related acupoints will be tested by pressure pain threshold gauge (PTG). Assessors will put continuous pressure on the surface of acupoints vertically until participants feel pain to measure the threshold.
Time frame: baseline
Serum follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH)
The increasing of FSH is widely clinical accepted for measuring ovarian function, which is one of the main symptoms of Diminished Ovarian Reserve. Participants in this study will be asked to take the serum FSH text between day2 to day4 of menstrual period in whole observation.
Time frame: baseline
Serum Anti-Müllerian Hormone (AMH)
AMH is another recommend index to measure ovarian function. Compared to FSH, Anti-Müllerian Hormone has less fluctuation and more accuracy. The normal value of serum AMH is 2-6.8ng/ml in follicular phase, and lower the value, the worse condition. The serum AMH will be measured on day 2-4 of the menstrual cycle at the basement and the end of the treatment.
Time frame: baseline
The modified Kupperman Index(KI)
The modified Kupperman Index (KI) is widely used for female self-evaluation of the severity of menopausal symptoms in clinical practice. It values 13 items of menopausal symptoms on a scale of 0 to 3. The final score of KI is the sum of each score multiplied with the base score respectively, ranging from 0-63. The final KI score is less than 6 means normal, between 6 to 15 are classified as mild, 16 to 30 as moderate, and greater than 30 as severe.
Time frame: baseline
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