Up to ten percent of all women in Sweden can suffer from the hormonal disease PCOS, polycystic ovary syndrome.
Now new research shows that the syndrome can also be passed on to boys.
– It is clear that people are thinking about how it can affect me and my health today, says Emanuel Videla, whose mother has PCOS.
PCOS is a syndrome that means that a woman has high levels of male testosterone. As well as leading to obesity and incorrect insulin levels, the syndrome can also disrupt the menstrual cycle.
Liselotte Videla found out at her first gynecologist visit as a 20-year-old that she might be affected. She had completely missed periods between the ages of 14 and 20.
– My body has produced too much insulin, it has not understood that there is free insulin in the body. I usually say that then I get so hungry that I can eat an entire elephant, an elephant made of sugar, says Liselotte Videla.
Can also affect the fetus
Now new research shows that obesity (obesity), and the high testosterone levels also affect the fetus and that even sons can be affected by the mother having PCOS, which leads to a doubled risk of obesity, among other things.
Research has previously shown that daughters have a fivefold increased risk of having PCOS-like symptoms because the hormones penetrate the fetus.
– For women who have PCOS and are obese, there is an increased risk that sons will also develop obesity and blood lipid disorders later in life, says Elisabet Stener-Victorin, professor at Karolinska Institutet.
However, you can influence hormone levels by living healthily, which affects egg cells and sperm so that the bad characteristics are not passed on.
The son: “Thinking about how it might affect me”
After hormone treatment in her 20s, Liselotte Videla became pregnant.
– Then there was an early miscarriage, then a few more months passed and then a son named Emanuel was born, she says.
Now the son Emanuel Videla is thinking about whether he too may be affected by symptoms as a result of the mother’s diagnosis.
– It is under-researched how it affects men, so it is difficult to know exactly what is what or what can be linked to what. But it is clear that people are thinking about how it can affect me and my health today, he says.