4. Discussion
kidney qi deficiency
In this study, we determined the effect of acupuncture on the outcome of IVF in elderly infertile women with kidney qi deficiency and explored its possible mechanism from the perspective of pseudo-targeted metabolomics of follicular fluid. We found that the 2PN fertilization rate, high-quality embryo rate, and cumulative pregnancy rate of the treatment group were significantly increased compared with the HA group (Previous study on non-targeted metabolomics screened out several metabolic markers in follicular fluid of elderly patients with kidney qi deficiency.Through the pathway analysis of different metabolites, there were 3 major related metabolic pathways, namely Retinol metabolism, Glycine, serine and threonine metabolism, and Glycerophospholipid metabolism. The 3 metabolic pathways are described below respectively.