**Female Infertility Associated to** *Chlamydia trachomatis* **Infection**

Agustín Luján, Silvina Fili and María Teresa Damiani

Additional information is available at the end of the chapter

http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/62462

#### **Abstract**

*Chlamydia trachomatis* (CT) is the most common agent of bacterial sexually transmitted in‐ fections, both in developed and developing countries. It clearly constitutes a major burden on public health. Screening programs and current research are mainly focused on decreas‐ ing the high incidence of chlamydial infections as well as their associated morbidity.

The greater clinical impact of CT infections occurs in women of reproductive age. Acute CT infections are often associated to urethritis, mucopurulent cervicitis, endometritis, salpingi‐ tis, and pelvic inflammatory disease (PID). A vast proportion of CT infections are likely un‐ derestimated because of their asymptomatic clinical course. This leads to repeat and chronic infections, which have deleterious impact on the female reproductive health. Among the complications of the CT chronic infections are PID, ectopic pregnancy, preterm birth, tubal obstruction and female infertility, which are of great interest in the reproduc‐ tion field.

**Keywords:** *Chlamydia trachomatis*, intracellular pathogens, bacterial sexually transmitted infections, tubal obstruction, female infertility
