The Role of Ovarian Volume As a Diagnostic Criterion for Chinese Adolescents with Polycystic Ovary Syndrome

Background This study revisited the ovarian volume (OV) as one of the diagnostic criteria for Chinese adolescents with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). It is unknown whether the threshold of 10 cm3 for the OV, chosen at the PCOS international consensus in 2003, was optimal for Chinese PCOS adolescents or not. Methods 69 adolescent PCOS patients and 26 controls were involved in this study. Ultrasound examination was performed between cycle days 2 and 7 or at random with a 6-MHz transvaginal transducer. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves analysis was mainly used for statistical analysis. Results Mean OV and maximum OV were significantly larger in PCOS group than that in controls. The area under the ROC curve was >0.8 for both criteria, indicating a satisfactory diagnostic potency. The two criteria had no statistical difference in diagnostic potency. Setting the threshold of mean OV at 6.74 cm3 offered the best compromise between specificity (92.3%) and sensitivity (75.4%) and setting the threshold of maximum OV at 7.82 cm3 offered the best compromise between specificity (88.5%) and sensitivity (73.9%). Conclusions OV yields good diagnostic accuracy to distinguish normal ovaries from polycystic ovaries in Chinese adolescents, but for Chinese PCOS adolescents, the best compromise between sensitivity and specificity was obtained with a threshold set at 6.74 cm3 for mean ovarian volume and at 7.82 cm3 for maximum ovarian volume instead of the 10 cm3 threshold proposed by the Rotterdam consensus conference based on general PCOS patients.