Association between Chlamydia trachomatis antibodies and subfertility in the Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1966 (NFBC 1966), at the age of 31 years

Abstract

The objective of this study was to assess the serological association between previous Chlamydia trachomatis infection and subfertility in a general population sample. A nested case (n = 493)-control (n = 986) study in a population-based birth cohort consisting of 12,058 live births from the year 1966 was conducted. The analysis was restricted to those 6007 cohort members who replied to a postal inquiry and participated in a health examination including blood samples at the age of 31 years. The presence of C. trachomatis-specific serum IgG antibodies was screened by a synthetic peptide-based enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. All the positive sera were further tested by the microimmunofluorescence method using immunotype pools and individual immunotypes of C. trachomatis as antigens. An association was found between the detection of immunotype-specific C. trachomatis antibodies and subfertility both in men and women. The results of the present study confirm the serological association between past C. trachomatis infections and subfertility in male or female partners of the couple in the population-based sample.

Chlamydial Antibodies and Risk of Prostate Cancer

“…Recently, it has been suggested that lack of IgA antibodies to the Hsp60s of C. trachomatis predisposes to male infertility (40). However, the role of serology in the search of correlation between C. trachomatis infection and male infertility has been questioned (41)(42)(43).…”

Identification of Antigen-Specific Antibody Responses Associated with Upper Genital Tract Pathology in Mice Infected with Chlamydia muridarum

“…In particular, an elevated level of anti-chlamydial heat shock protein 60 (HSP60) antibodies has been associated with tubal disease (3,6,19,26,27,30,35,54,55,60), which correlates with the elevated production of chlamydial HSP60 during persistent infection (21,30,35). It is postulated that the elevated chlamydial HSP60 triggers a strong response that may cross-react with human HSP60 due to the high degree of conservation between human and C. trachomatis HSP60 (4,7,8).…”

Für die andrologische Diagnostik relevante sexuell übertragbare Infektionen

“…Aber auch für Männer zeigten sich in einer epidemiologischen Studie Hinweise für eine Assoziation einer zurückliegenden Chlamydieninfektion mit Infertilität [12]. Da im Seminalplasma der Direktnachweis der obligat intrazellulären Chlamydien und die Bestimmung von Chlamydienantikörpern nicht zuverlässig sind [27], konnte dies wohl auch aufgrund methodischer Probleme bisher nicht weiter aufgeklärt werden (.…”