Comparative study of the effect of lifestyle modifications in obese pcos patients versus lean pcos women

Aim & Objective: PCOS is the most common endocrine disorder affecting women of fertile years. There are two phenotypes in PCOS, namely obese PCOS and lean PCOS. Lifestyle modification is one of the effective ways of management of PCOS. This study was planned to compare the effects of lifestyle modification in obese and lean PCOS patients. Materials and Method: Our study included the data of PCOS patients attending Gynecology OPD services in GMKMCH who followed up over a period of 9 months from August 2021 to April 2022. All the PCOS patients who were initiated on lifestyle modification like low GI diet which is routinely advised were recruited over a period of 3 months and followed up for 6 months. The issues addressed included relief of symptoms – menstrual cycle regularization, improvement in fertility, acne and acanthosis nigricans. PCOS patients were categorized as obese when the BMI was ≥ 25 kg/m² & lean PCOS as BMI between 18.5 to 24.9 kg/m². Results: Of the 400 patients who followed-up as well as complied with the diet, 208 were obese PCOS and 77 were lean PCOS patient. 190 (91.3%) had menstrual irregularities out of which 168 (88.4%) had their menstrual cycles regularized with lifestyle modification at the end of 6 months. 71 (34.1%) had acne from whom 2 (2.8%) had their acne relieved. 105 (50.4%) had acanthosis nigricans among which 1 (1.4%) had reduction of the skin lesions. 71 (92.2%) patients of the non-obese patients had menstrual irregularities out of which 16 (22.5%) had their cycles regularized. 40 (56.3%) patients had acne of which 1 (2.5%) had improvement in acne. 19 (26.7%) had acanthosis nigricans. Of them, no improvement was seen in this study. In the married patients with PCOS, 17.6% conceived in obese PCOS whereas 5% conceived in lean PCOS.