Cardiometabolic risk in polycystic ovary syndrome

Polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) is one of the most frequently diagnosed endocrinopathies in women, and also one of the most heterogeneous endocrine disorders. In addition to being the most frequent cause of female infertility, PCOS is also said to increase the risk of cardiovascular disease, glucose intolerance and type 2 diabetes. Other risk factors such as obesity, a positive family history of type 2 diabetes and hyperandrogenism may also contribute to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease among women affected by PCOS. The risk assessment of metabolic disorders should be commonly recommended for PCOS patients in everyday medical practice. It makes possible to precisely determine the goals of nutritional interventions among PCOS women. The following work constitutes a review of articles from 1996–2019 available in the PubMed (National Center for Biotechnology Information) database and the Polish Medical Bibliography (Polska Bibliografia Lekarska). For this purpose, the following controlled vocabulary has been used: “PCOS”, “overweight”, “obesity”, “insulin resistance”, “hyperandrogenism”, “hypertension”, “lipid disorders”, “diabetes”, “cardiometabolic risk”, “cardiovascular disease”, and “lifestyle modifications”.