Protective Effect of Royal Jelly on In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) in Male Mice Treated with Oxymetholone

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to investigate the effects of royal jelly (RJ) on catalase, total antioxidant capacity and embryo development in adult mice treated with oxymetholone (OXM). MATERIALS AND METHODS: In this exprimental study, 32 male and 96 female adult Naval Medical Research Institute (NMRI) mice (7-9 weeks of age) with a ratio of 1:3 for fertili- zation purposes were randomly divided into 4 groups as follows: i. Control group (n=8) receiving 0.1 ml/mice saline daily by gavage for 30 day, ii. RJ group (n=8) treated with RJ at a dose of 100 mg/kg daily by gavage for 30 days, iii. OXM group (n=8) receiving OXM at the dose of 5 mg/kg daily by gavage for 30 days and iv. RJ+OXM group (n=8) receiving RJ at the dose of 100 mg/kg daily by gavage concomitant with 100 mg/kg OXM adminis- tration for 30 days. RESULTS: Analysis revealed a significant reduction in catalase, total antioxidant, as well as embryo development in OXM group (P<0.05). However, RJ group showed a salient recovery in the all of the above mentioned parameters and embryo toxicity. CONCLUSION: The results of this study indicated a partially protective effect of RJ against OXM-induced embryo toxicity.