A male infertility cause is often overlooked because couples presume fertility issues must be attributable to the woman, but a male factor infertility cause is present in about 10,000,000 men in the U.S. Alone. About 35 p.c of all cases of infertility arise exclusively from the man’s sterility and about 20 % of the time, the woman and man both have fertility issues. That suggests over half of all cases of sterility involve a male element. Understanding the details behind a male factor infertility cause can help a pair search out suitable treatment.
For couples with male factor sterility, probabilities are the person has an infertility cause mentioned below:
1. Low sperm density – the most typical male infertility cause is a low sperm density. A typical fertile male has about 20,000,000 sperm in each milliliter of semen. Most tests will identify a low sperm density as less than 10,000,000 per milliliter. If you get tested, ask about the number rather than for a straightforward “normal or unusual” answer, as a borderline result could be a contributing infertility cause worth addressing even if you do not meet the official criterion for having a clinical low sperm density.
2. Poor Sperm mobility – A sperm’s motility is the rate and path with which it moves toward an egg. Poor motility can be an infertility cause even when sperm density is ordinary. Frequently mobility is negatively impacted by poorly formed sperm. The amount of the size of the head of a sperm to its tail affects its swimming ability, as does the form of the head itself. Both motility and quality (shape) can be evaluated in a sperm sample. It’s often best to get two separate sperm tests to confirm results, in case external circumstances caused one sample to appear abnormal even when there are no underlying issues.
3. Structural Anomaly – If a man’s reproductive organs experience scarring or are poorly formed, leading to an obstruction of the vas deferens or the epididymis, then the ability of sperm to travel from the testicles to the uterus could be blocked, which is one more possible infertility cause.
These are specific conditions that will affect sperm density or quality or the structural integrity of a male’s reproductive organs:
1. Varicocele – When veins in the scrotum are swollen or enlarged (think of the more well known varicose veins in older women’s legs), it can be an infertility cause. It would appear the varicocele condition has effects on the sperm in a number of ways including sperm density, sperm mobility and sperm quality.
2. Under-developed testes – this condition is sometimes a consequence of a mumps infection, a hernia surgery, an injury or a birth imperfection. If some cases the testicles are undescended — that is . They remain within the body cavity rather than moving down into the scrotum.
3. Sexually communicated diseases (STDs) – STDs and some other diseases (mumps and tuberculosis most commonly) can cause scarring within the male reproductive organs. There are a considerable number of STDs that will go undetected in men till they’re made public as an infertility cause.
4. Age – Many are surprised to learn that age has an effect on a man’s fertility. While the role of age in a woman’s reproductive process is more assertive and has been studied a good deal, age of the person should not be rejected as an infertility cause, as men also show a steady decline in fertility after the age of approximately forty.
5. Cancer – Males that endure treatment for cancer often have sperm production momentarily or permanently affected as a result of chemo or radiation.
6. Vasectomy reversals – After a vasectomy, men develop an autoimmune response. Sperm essentially are produced after a vasectomy, but may leak out into the body where immune cells target them as attackers. When a vasectomy is reversed through surgery, this autoimmunity may continue and be an infertility cause.
7. XX Male Syndrome – A man’s chromosomes usually include one X and one Y chromosome. Because of an a rare sex chromosomal disorder, some men are born with two X chromosomes and one Y chromosome, a condition known as XX male syndrome. XX male syndrome occurs in approximately one in twenty thousand to one in 25,000 individuals. People with the disorder usually have normal male physical features including normal male body, genitals, and testicles. However , all males with XX male syndrome are sterile because they lack the genes on the Y chromosome involved in making sperm. Because most males XX male syndrome look like and identify as males, many do not know they have XX male syndrome until they try and have their own youngsters and can not do so. It is then the syndrome is exposed as an infertility cause.
If a pair faces difficulty conceiving as a consequence of a male infertility cause, there are choices that can improve their probabilities in the great majority of cases by isolating and employing the very best quality sperm from a sample or by using procedures that assist the sperm in reaching the ovaries. Further, a person can get ready for an infertility cause that is a result of age, cancer treatments or vasectomy reversal by preserving healthy sperm samples ahead of time. In the very rare case of a person who produces no practicable sperm (as in the xx male syndrome), then donor material can be considered.
Anna Short has developed expertise on infertility through a mixture of private experience and exhaustive research. For more information on infertility causes, visit infertility-options-info.com. Be sure to check out her free minicourse covering various aspects of infertility.