Semen Analysis in Husbands of Infertile Couples

Mah, Sang Yol; Wang, Chong Sun

Abstract

Since March 1978, 78 men, husbands of infertile couples who consulted our Severance Hospital Urologic department were instructed to collect seminal fluid samples after at least 3 days of abstinence. Of these 78 patients 28 (35.9%) demonstrated aspermia. The remaining 50 patients were evaluated with past history and physical examination. The semen was examined for liquefaction, volume, sperm motility, morphology, and WBC count. The results were as follows: 1. The mean age was 31.8 years and mean period of infertility was 3.4 years. 2. 34% of the patients had suffered from urethritis, or epididymitis. 3. Varicoceles were found in 14% of the patients. 4. The mean pH of the specimens was 7.4, time of liquefaction was 13.9 minutes and in all of the patients did liquefaction occur within 30 minutes. 5. The volume of the ejaculate averaged 3.4 ml, and in 6% of the patients the volume was below 1 ml. 6. The sperm concentration averaged 60.5 million/ml and 34% had concentrations less than 20 million. The total number of spermatozoa per ejaculate averaged 205.8 million and 26% had total sperm counts under 50 million. 7. Ployspermia was found in 2 men (4%) 8. The mean percentage of active sperm was 53.7% 9. The motile sperm count averaged 31.1 million/ml and the total motile sperm per ejaculate averaged 107.6 million. 10. The percentage of oval cells or normal sperm averaged 68.1% 11. In patients with WBC more than 5/HPF in semen, mean sperm motility (42.0%) was lower than that of the other group (60.3%) 12. According to the fertility index, infertile was 6%, subfertile 44%, relative fertile 30% and highly fertile 20%. 13. In patients with varicocele, mean of the sperm motility was lower than that of patients without varicocele.