Status of Serum Iron and Fasting Serum Glucose in Reproductive Aged Women Taking Combined Oral Contraceptive Pill.

ABSTRACT

The oral contraceptive pill, 'the pill', was introduced in the beginning of the 1960s. Presently, worldwide about 100 million women are current users of combined oral hormonal contraceptives (COC) most frequently used in the western world. Oral contraceptive use has been associated with decreased menstrual blood losses; thus, can independently reduce the risk of anemia and iron deficiency in women. Manufacturers have recently started to include supplemental iron in the non-hormonal placebo tablets of some contraceptives. This study was done to evaluate the status of serum iron and fasting serum glucose in combined oral contraceptive pill users in comparison to non-users. This cross sectional study was carried out in the Department of Physiology, Mymensingh Medical College, Bangladesh from July 2021 to June 2022. A total number of 120 reproductive aged women, age ranged from 15-55 years was included in this study. Among them, sixty (60) combined oral contraceptive pill users subjects were taken as study group (Group II) and sixty (60) age matched oral pill non users subjects were taken as control group (Group I). Data were expressed as mean±SD and statistical significance of difference among the group was calculated by unpaired students' 't' test. The mean±SD of serum iron of control group (Group I) and study group (Group II) were 93.22±17.19µg/dl and 181.57±22.06µg/dl respectively. The mean±SD of fasting serum glucose of control group (Group I) and study group (Group II) were 4.67±0.61mmol/L and 6.61±0.61mmol/L respectively. Serum iron and fasting serum glucose increased in study group in comparison to control group. Result is statistically highly significant (p<0.001). So there from this study it can be concluded that there is significant association of serum iron and fasting serum glucose with oral contraceptives.