ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Nutr.
Sec. Clinical Nutrition
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fnut.2025.1650311
This article is part of the Research TopicMaternal Metabolic Health: From Preconception to PostpartumView all 12 articles
Depression score and body mass index mediate the association between dietary vitamin C intake and female infertility: A study based on NHANES 2013–2018
Provisionally accepted
- Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, China
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Background: The supplement of antioxidants to improve fertility has received widespread attention. The efficacy of the dietary antioxidant vitamin C (VC) on female infertility has not been fully elucidated. This study investigates the relationship between VC intake and infertility in terms of depression score and body mass index (BMI). Methods: Our cross-sectional study included 2381 adult American females aged from 18 to 44 from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES, 2013–2018) database. Multiple logistic regressions, smoothed curve fitting, mediation and sensitivity analysis were conducted to describe the relationship between VC intake and infertility. Results: Compared to the low VC intake group (Q1), the probability of female infertility in the highest group (Q4) decreased by 39.4% (adjusted OR = 0.606; 95% CI: 0.419, 0.878, P = 0.008). A threshold nonlinear association between VC and infertility was more significant in women aged from 18 to 34 (P = 0.033). Moreover, the relationship between VC and infertility was mediated by 5.28% depression (P=0.034) and 7.83% BMI (P=0.010), respectively. Conclusions: The protective effect of VC on female fertility was most significant in the group with the highest VC intake. The association between VC intake and the likelihood of female infertility was non-linear and smallest infertility index occurred when VC intake reached 132.7 mg in women aged 18 to 34. Depression score and BMI seemed to mediate the relationship. However, further research was needed to confirm the interaction effects of VC, depression and BMI on female infertility from basic and clinical perspectives.
Keywords: Dietary vitamin C intake, Female infertility, NHANES database, Cross-Sectional Studies, Depression score, Body Mass Index
Received: 19 Jun 2025; Accepted: 25 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Zheng, Ren and Tan. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Yong Tan, Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, China
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