Noninvasive Imaging of the Meiotic Spindle of In Vivo Matured Oocytes From Infertile Women With Endometriosis

The objectives of this prospective study were to evaluate the nuclear maturation stage and the presence and location of meiotic spindles of in vivo matured oocytes from infertile women with and without endometriosis (male or tubal causes of infertility) undergoing stimulated cycles for intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI). We also compared the ICSI outcomes among groups. We analyzed the meiotic spindles of oocytes from 36 patients with endometriosis I/II, 24 with endometriosis III/IV, and 60 without endometriosis (male or tubal causes of infertility). The oocytes were imaged using polarization microscopy. There were no differences in the number of oocytes in telophase I (mean [standard deviation]: 0.1 [0.5], 0.2 [0.4], and 0.2 [0.5], respectively, in the endometriosis I/II, endometriosis III/IV, and control groups), in metaphase II with visible spindles (4.2 [2.5], 3.1 [2.0], and 3.6 [2.2], respectively, in the endometriosis I/II, endometriosis III/IV, and control groups), and in spindle location among groups. We can conclude from this study that noninvasive analysis of spindles from in vivo matured oocytes of infertile patients with endometriosis did not demonstrate significant differences in terms of the nuclear maturation stage, the percentage of oocytes in metaphase II with visible spindles, and the spindle localization when compared to the control group. However, it is important to state that there are no studies evaluating the accuracy of polarization microscopy for the detection of meiotic anomalies in human oocytes, which would need to be better evaluated in future studies using an appropriate methodology.