You are here

  • Home
  • Archive
  • Volume 97, Issue 2
  • Global epidemiology of Neisseria gonorrhoeae in infertile populations: systematic review, meta-analysis and metaregression

Article Text

Article menu

Download PDFPDF

Epidemiology
Original research
Global epidemiology of Neisseria gonorrhoeae in infertile populations: systematic review, meta-analysis and metaregression
  1. Hiam Chemaitelly1,
  2. Alzahraa Majed1,
  3. Farah Abu-Hijleh2,
  4. Karel Blondeel3,4,
  5. Thabo Christopher Matsaseng3,5,
  6. James Kiarie3,
  7. Igor Toskin3,
  8. Laith J Abu-Raddad1,6
  1. 1 Infectious Disease Epidemiology Group, Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar, Cornell University, Qatar Foundation-Education City, Doha, Qatar
  2. 2 Department of Public Health, College of Health Sciences, Academic Quality Affairs Office, QU Health, Qatar University, Doha, Qatar
  3. 3 Department of Reproductive Health and Research, World Health Organization, Geneva, Switzerland
  4. 4 Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium
  5. 5 Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology, Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch, South Africa
  6. 6 Department of Healthcare Policy and Research, Weill Cornell Medicine, Cornell University, New York, New York, USA
  1. Correspondence to Mrs Hiam Chemaitelly, Infectious Disease Epidemiology Group, Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar, Cornell University, Qatar-Foundation, Education City, Doha 24144, Qatar; hsc2001{at}qatar-med.cornell.edu; Dr Igor Toskin, Department of Reproductive Health and Research, World Health Organization, Geneva, Switzerland; toskini{at}who.int; Dr Laith J Abu-Raddad, Infectious Disease Epidemiology Group, Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar, Cornell University, Qatar-Foundation, Education City, Doha 24144, Qatar; lja2002{at}qatar-med.cornell.edu

Abstract

Objective To provide an in-depth systematic assessment of the global epidemiology of gonorrhoea infection in infertile populations.

Methods A systematic literature review was conducted up to 29 April 2019 on international databases and WHO regional databases, and reported following Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines. All prevalence measures of gonorrhoea infection among infertile populations, based on primary data, qualified for inclusion. Infertile populations were broadly defined to encompass women/men undergoing infertility evaluation or treatment (infertility clinic attendees and partners). Pooled mean prevalence by relevant strata was estimated using random-effects meta-analysis. Associations with prevalence and sources of heterogeneity were explored using metaregression. Risk of bias was assessed using four quality domains.

Findings A total of 147 gonorrhoea prevalence studies were identified from 56 countries. The pooled mean prevalence of current gonorrhoea infection was estimated globally at 2.2% (95% CI 1.3% to 3.2%), with the highest prevalence in Africa at 5.0% (95% CI 1.9% to 9.3%). The mean prevalence was higher for populations with tubal factor infertility (3.6%, 95% CI 0.9%–7.7%) and mixed cause and unexplained infertility (3.6%, 95% CI 0.0% to 11.6%) compared with other diagnoses, such as ovarian and non-tubal infertility (0.1%, 95% CI 0.0% to 0.8%), and for secondary (2.5%, 95% CI 0.2% to 6.5%) compared with primary (0.5%, 95% CI 0.0% to 1.7%) infertility. Metaregression identified evidence of variations in prevalence by region and by infertility diagnosis, higher prevalence in women than men and a small-study effect. There was a trend of declining prevalence by about 3% per year over the last four decades (OR=0.97, 95% CI 0.95 to 0.99).

Conclusions Gonorrhoea prevalence in infertile populations is several folds higher than that in the general population, with even higher prevalence in women with tubal factor infertility and in individuals with secondary infertility. These findings support the potential role of gonorrhoea in infertility and suggest that some infertility is possibly preventable by controlling gonorrhoea transmission.

PROSPERO registration number CRD42018102934.

  • gonorrhoea
  • Neisseria gonorrhoeae
  • infertility
  • epidemiology (general)
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.

https://doi.org/10.1136/sextrans-2020-054515

Statistics from Altmetric.com

    Request Permissions

    If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

    View Full Text

    Footnotes

    • Contributors HC contributed to the study design, conducted the systematic searches of the literature, selected studies for inclusion, performed data extraction and data analyses, and wrote the first draft of the paper. AM contributed to title and abstract screening, full-text screening and data extraction. FAH double extracted the data. IT and LJA conceived and led the design of the study. LJA led the data extraction, analyses and drafting of the article. KB, JK, and TCM contributed to the study design. All authors contributed to the discussion and interpretation of the results and to the writing of the article, and have read and approved the final manuscript.

    • Funding This work was supported by funding from the WHO. This work was also funded by the UNDP-UNFPA-UNICEF-WHO-World Bank Special Programme of Research, Development and Research Training in Human Reproduction, a cosponsored programme executed by the WHO. JK and IT are staff members of the WHO. The authors alone are responsible for the views expressed in this publication, and they do not necessarily represent the views, decisions or policies of the WHO.

    • Disclaimer The authors alone are responsible for the views expressed in this publication and they do not necessarily represent the views, decisions or policies of the WHO.

    • Competing interests The authors have no conflicts of interests to declare.

    • Patient consent for publication Not required.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; internally peer reviewed.

    • Data availability statement All data relevant to the study are included in the article or uploaded as supplementary information. All data are available as part of the manuscript and its supplementary material.