Pipet curet

Six regularly cycling, non-smoking healthy volunteers underwent collection of endometrial biopsy under local anesthesia using a suction curette (Pipet Curet, CooperSurgical, USA) at cycle day 5–9. All participants were between 18–35 years and had a body mass index ranging 19–28. Hormonal medication was not allowed at least three months prior to biopsy sampling. No women had any current chronic disease, endocrine disorder, or continuous medication. One woman had had an uneventful pregnancy with normal birth at term and another woman had had one miscarriage prior to the study, she later gave birth at term after IVF treatment. No cause of the infertility could be determined. The other four women had not been pregnant. Serum levels of follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), luteinizing hormone (LH), estradiol-17β (E2), total testosterone sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG) and fasting glucose were determined as described previously [9 (link), 19 (link)]. FSH (5.7±0.8 IU/l), LH (5.9±1.4 IU/l), E2 (253 (115–466 pmol/l)), total testosterone (0.9±0.3 nmol/l), SHBG (69.2±26.9 nmol/l) and fasting glucose levels (4.8±0.5 mmol/l) were in the normal range for all of them (values presented are means±SD or medians and interquartile ranges, depending on the distribution).

All participants in this study performed daily urine dipstick test from day 9 of the menstrual cycle onwards to detect the luteinizing hormone (LH) surge and endometrial biopsies were precisely obtained on day LH+7 in the non-conception cycles. A Pipet Curet (Cooper Surgical Inc., Trumbull, CT, USA) was used to obtain endometrial specimens, which were then immediately put into 10% neutral buffered formalin for over-night fixation.

The subjects were six healthy women aged 21–33 with regular menstrual cycles, body mass index 22–28 kg/m², no hormonal treatment 3 months prior to examination, no chronic disease, non-smoking and no regular medication. On cycle day 5–9, an endometrial biopsy was collected using an endometrial suction curette (Pipet Curet, CooperSurgical, USA).