Icariin, A Novel Promising Complementary Therapeutic Strategy in the Management of Female Infertility: A Literature Review

Abstract

The prevalence of pre-menopausal female infertility is increasing considerably due to various causes such as environmental pollutants, increased administration of chemotherapeutics and radiation exposure, microbial infections, and genetic/epigenetic alterations. However, the cur-rent therapeutical strategies remain unfavorite as the disadvantages are strongly challenging. Icariin (ICI) is a phytoestrogen that exerts some promising properties in order to alleviate fe-male infertility. Therefore, the current literature review aimed to evaluate the conducted studies regarding the beneficial impacts of ICI on the female reproductive system and female fecundity. The findings of the present study revealed that ICI is able to modulate the levels of reproductive hormones as it causes a significant decrement in the levels of luteinizing hormone (LH) and follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) while increasing the levels of estrogen and progesterone. Furthermore, the administration of ICI results in a dramatic alteration in the expression of sex steroids' receptors, particularly in female reproductive tissues. In addition, preserving ovarian follicular reserve, improving the ovarian and uterine histoarchitecture, elongating the estrous cycle duration, and eventually advancing the female fecundity are other major effects of ICI on the female reproductive system. Despite these desired beneficial properties, the current knowl-edge appears to be insufficient, hence further investigations, particularly on humans, are en-couraged. To the best of our knowledge, this review provides a comprehensive information re-garding the beneficial effects of ICI on female infertility for the firs time.GMJ.2023;12:e2528