Polycystic ovary syndrome: An ancient disorder?
Open accessAbstract
Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) appears to be an ancient disorder, which has persisted in human evolution despite reduced fecundity because of the benefits to affected women such as greater sturdiness and improved energy utilization, a rearing advantage for their children and kin, and a reduction in the risk of perinatal mortality. This raises the possibility that gene variants that are eventually found to be associated with PCOS will be similar across ethnic groups and races.
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Almost all pre-industrial societies and animal populations experienced seasonal or unpredictable episodes of food shortage that applied evolutionary pressure to develop metabolic and reproductive adaptive survival responses.
“It is generally accepted that almost all pre-industrial societies and animal populations experienced seasonal or unpredictable episodes of food shortage that applied evolutionary pressure to develop metabolic and reproductive adaptive survival responses [17,49].”
From Polycystic Ovary Syndrome: An Evolutionary Adaptation to Lifestyle and the Environment (2022) · cites this paper as [17]
In “BUT WHY SHOULD A DISORDER THAT REDUCES REPRODUCTIVE POTENTIAL THRIVE AND PERSIST ACROSS MILLENNIA?” (page not provided), the paper proposes that food deprivation favored energy-storage traits and that lower fecundity could benefit hunter-gatherer women and their offspring. “FIGURE 2” also describes periodic privation in later agricultural societies. The paper does not extend this account to almost all pre-industrial societies or animal populations, and presents the evolutionary explanation as a hypothesis rather than a generally accepted conclusion. (LLM, conf=0.86)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredThe developmental origins of PCOS may have been due to different factors in ancestral and modern populations.
“The developmental origins of PCOS may have been due to different factors in ancestral and modern populations [17,60].”
From Polycystic Ovary Syndrome: An Evolutionary Adaptation to Lifestyle and the Environment (2022) · cites this paper as [17]
The section on why PCOS persisted across millennia proposes that environmental stressors favored PCOS-associated traits in Paleolithic hunter-gatherers. The Conclusions say ancestral gene variants persisted after the Neolithic transition. These passages support a contrast between ancestral and later environments, but they do not say that different factors caused the developmental origins of PCOS in ancestral and modern populations; page numbers are unavailable in our copy. (LLM, conf=0.79)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredWomen with PCOS may represent the metabolic elite end of the normal distribution curve, being able to efficiently store energy in periods of food abundance and down-regulate fertility in times of food scarcity, or even in anticipation of reduced seasonal food availability as a predictive adaptive response.
“From an evolutionary perspective, women with PCOS may represent the “metabolic elite” end of the normal distribution curve, being able to efficiently store energy in periods of food abundance and down-regulate fertility in times of food scarcity, or even in anticipation of reduced seasonal food availability as a predictive adaptive response [16,17,60].”
From Polycystic Ovary Syndrome: An Evolutionary Adaptation to Lifestyle and the Environment (2022) · cites this paper as [17]
The section on why PCOS persisted across millennia proposes that energy-storage capacity helped people survive food deprivation and that lower fecundity could have conferred advantages. It does not describe women with PCOS as the “metabolic elite” end of a normal distribution or say that fertility is down-regulated in anticipation of seasonal scarcity as a predictive adaptive response. (LLM, conf=0.86)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredEnvironmental stress, infection, nutrient deprivation, fetal growth restriction and stress hormone responses may have resulted in maternally mediated modulation of gene expression in ancestral offspring.
“It has been hypothesized that environmental stress, infection, nutrient deprivation, fetal growth restriction and stress hormone responses may have resulted in maternally mediated modulation of gene expression in ancestral offspring [17,110].”
From Polycystic Ovary Syndrome: An Evolutionary Adaptation to Lifestyle and the Environment (2022) · cites this paper as [17]
In the section on why PCOS persisted across millennia (page not provided), the paper hypothesizes that environmental stress and food deprivation favored ancestral offspring and that their intrauterine environment may have affected survival. It does not describe infection, fetal growth restriction, stress-hormone responses, or maternally mediated modulation of gene expression. (LLM, conf=0.82)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredIn evolutionary terms, women with a PCOS metabolic phenotype would have increased survival chances during times of environmental or physiological demand for altered energy metabolism, but be more vulnerable to the pathological effects of insulin resistance when exposed to modern lifestyle factors.
“In evolutionary terms, women with a PCOS metabolic phenotype would have increased survival chances during times of environmental or physiological demand for altered energy metabolism, but be more vulnerable to the pathological effects of IR when exposed to modern lifestyle factors [14,17,159].”
From Polycystic Ovary Syndrome: An Evolutionary Adaptation to Lifestyle and the Environment (2022) · cites this paper as [17]
Split into 2 atoms — 1 confirmed, 1 partially supported, 0 disputed, 0 misattributed, 0 unverifiable. Expand the claim to see per-atom verdicts.
Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
The PCOS phenotype may have been invoked in specific environmental conditions in ancestral populations as a short, medium or even long-term adaptive survival mechanism.
“It has been proposed that the PCOS phenotype may have been invoked in specific environmental conditions in ancestral populations as a short, medium or even long-term adaptive survival mechanism [15,16,17].”
From Polycystic Ovary Syndrome: An Evolutionary Adaptation to Lifestyle and the Environment (2022) · cites this paper as [17]
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
The citation lists haven’t been fetched yet
References 37 · Cited by 164
Research works printed but not linked: 3
- [2]2. Temkin O. Soranus' Gynecology. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991.
- [3]3. Rosner F, Munter S. The medical aphorism of Moses Maimonides. Vol. 2. New York: Yeshiva University Press, 1971.
- [24]24. Eggers S, Hashimoto DM, Kirchengast S. Anthropo- logischer Anzeiger; Bericht € uber die biologisch- anthropologische. Literatur 2007;65:169-79.
- Authors
- Azziz, R., Dumesic, D. A., & Goodarzi, M. O.
- Affiliations
- Cedars-Sinai Medical Center (US)
- University of Wisconsin–Madison (US)
- Corresponding author
- Azziz, Ricardo
- Venue
- Fertility and Sterility
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2011-04
- Volume
- 95
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 1544-1548
- ISSN
- 0015-0282 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC3164771
- OpenAlex
- W2157922423
- Semantic Scholar
- 56403b8c44ac98e501d977dee0dad2b9c06e9062
- Cited by
- 164
- References
- 37
- Citations by year
- 2026: 6 · 2025: 12 · 2024: 12 · 2023: 14 · 2022: 16 · 2021: 15 · 2020: 11 · 2019: 11 · 2018: 6 · 2017: 10 · 2016: 15 · 2015: 7 · 2014: 13 · 2013: 5 · 2012: 8
- FWCI
- 0.72
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Fertility and Sterility (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health (R01-DK79888, R01-HD29364)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Reproductive Medicine › Ovarian function and disorders
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Genetic and Kidney Cyst Diseases
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Reproductive Biology and Fertility
- Keywords
- polycystic ovary syndrome, evolutionary medicine, fecundity, energy utilization, perinatal mortality, genetic variants, reproductive fitness
- MeSH terms
- Female, History of Medicine, Humans, Obesity, Polycystic Ovary Syndrome, Risk Factors, Linkage Disequilibrium, Prevalence, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Racial Groups, History, Ancient, History, Medieval
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
