Fertility Preservation in Patients with Endometrial Cancer

Abstract

Endometrial carcinoma (EC) is the most common gynaecological cancer, with 2-14% of cases occurring in women <40 years of age. When considering the increase in the delay of pregnancy in developing countries, the incidence of EC in nulliparous women is likely to increase. Younger women with EC have a chance to preserve their fertility due to the probability of being diagnosed with early-stage and low- grade endometrioid carcinomas. However, it should be noted that the most important step of fertility preservation in patients with EC is patient selection. The appropriate clinical criteria should include: a) well-differentiated histology; b) absence of myometrial invasion; c) absence of extrauterine or pelvic and pre-aortic lymphatic spread; and d) absence of synchronous ovarian tumour. There is no consensus regarding endometrial suppression therapy or the follow-up period for fertility preservation in women with EC. Therefore, this review aims to evaluate the current literature.

Keywords

• endometrial cancer
• fertility preservation
• fertility sparing
• progestin
• conservative treatment