Many large Danish researchstudies show that your lifestyle is connected to your fertility. The research shows, among other things, that alcohol, smoking, coffee and being overweight lower your fertility. We take a closer look at all of this in the article here, which is based on recent major Danish studies carried out by Øjvind Lidegaard, gynecologist and professor at Rigshospitalet, Hans Jakob Ingerslev, seniorphysician professor of reproductive medicine at Aarhus University Hospital and Hanne Udengaard, who is a research nurse at Herlev Hospital's Fertility Clinic
Smoking
Smoking impairs fertility by affecting ovarian function and inhibiting the fallopian tube. Smoking therefore reduces fertility, and this can be seen in the statistics. The risk of waiting more than 9 months to get pregnant is 19% in non-smoking women, while it is 24%in women who smoke 1-10 cigarettes per day and 30% for women who smoke more than 10 cigarettes per day. The negative impact is particularly significant in women who are over 30 years old.
In men, smoking does not play such a big role in relation to fertility
What you can do:
Stop smoking.Thereby you quickly achieve almost the same chance of becoming pregnant as with women who have never smoked. A reduction in the number of cigarettes smoked daily will also have a positive effect
Alcohol
According to the researchers, a large Danish study has shown that if a woman drinks between 1-5 items per week, her fertility will be impaired by 39%. If she drinks between 5-10 items per week, her fertility is reduced by 45%. If a woman drinks more than 10 items per week, her fertility will be reduced by 66%.
Once again, men are a bit better of as alcohol generally does not have a negative effect if he drinks less than 10 items per week. If he drinks more than 15 items a week, fertility will be impaired by approximately 20%.
What you can do:
Alcohol appears to have an even greater negative effect on fertility than smoking. Therefore, there can be a great deal to be gained by eliminating alcohol completely or, secondarily, cutting back on consumption.
Coffee
Several research studies have shown that drinking more than 5 cups of coffee a day can have a negative impact on fertility. Women who drink more than 5 cups of coffee daily have a 35% increased risk of having to wait more than a year to get pregnant.
What you can do:
Cut down on coffee consumption and drink less than 5 cups of coffee a day. It does not have any noticeable effect on fertility as long as you stay below the 5 daily cups of coffee.
Overweight
Being overweight has a negative impact on fertility because the fatty tissue disrupts the hormones that affect the woman's menstrual cycle. Therefore, severe overweight can also mean that you, as a woman, either stop menstruating or that menstruation becomes irregular. Studies show that if obese women lose 10% of their body weight (and more if you are very overweight) then 90% will regain regular menstrual cycles and ovulation. These studies have meant that many fertility clinics today require women with a BMI over 27 to lose 10% of their body weight to achieve normal ovulation and thereby increase the chances of pregnancy
What you can do:
As far as possible, try to stabilize the BMI between 19 and 25 and lose weight if you are overweight. It increases the chances of getting pregnant and at the same time reduces the risk of miscarriage if you do get pregnant. If you are trying to get pregnant, you can find our ovulation tests here: Ægløsningstests – Gravidtid, our sperm tests her: SwimCount Sædkvalitetstest – Gravidtid and our thermometers here: Termometre – Gravidtid
Source: Lifestyle - what you can do yourself - Regionshospitalet Randers (yumpu.com)