ORIGINAL ARTICLES A Multicenter Retrospective Cohort Study of the Profile of Seminal Fluid Analyses of Men Seeking Fertility Care at Different Hospitals

West Afr J Med . 2023 Aug 28;40(8):863-868.

Abstract

Abstract  in English, French

Background: Male infertility contributes 40 % of couple infertility. The prevalence of abnormal semen parameters has been on the increase. Age among other factors affects the fertility potential of males. This study analysed the pattern of seminal fluid parameters of males, seeking fertility treatment in hospitals and the relationship between age, volume and liquefaction time on these other semen parameters.

Methods: This is a multicentre retrospective cohort study conducted in eight secondary and tertiary hospitals in Nigeria. The case notes of couples that sort fertility care at the Gynaecology and Urology clinics of these hospitals from January 1st 2022 to December 31st 2022 were retrieved after receiving ethical approval. A purposeddesigned proforma based on the WHO manual for the examination of human semen was used for data collection. Outcome measures were time of semen collection and examination, volume of semen, sperm number, sperm concentration, PH, agglutination, liquefaction, motility,morphology, vitality, and white blood cell count. Data was analysed using SPSS version 23. Data were presented as means and proportions. P-value of < 0.05 was used as the level of significance.

Results: Overall, 1063 couples attended gynaecology and urology clinics with fertility-related concerns within the study period with a retrieval rate of 98.3%. The mean age of participants was 38.24 ± 8 years, while the mean semen volume and sperm concentrations were 2.62 ± 1.6 mls and 34.32 ± 7.4 million respectively. The age of participants significantly affected motility, volume and morphology (p-values of 0.001, 0.001 and 0.004 respectively). The total motility and sperm concentration have an inverse relationship with the age of the participants.

Conclusion: This study shows that sperm motility decreases with the age of participants. It was also observed that the most common combined abnormality was oligoasthenozoospermia.

Keywords: Male infertility; Nigeria; Seminal fluid abnormalities.

A O Ugwu ^1 2, E P Igbodike ³, R Funtua Anas ⁴, O A Kusamotu ¹, A Adefemi ⁵, O Anyobode ⁵, C J Okeke ^6 7, B S Umezuluike ⁷, J S Shehu ⁴, S Ige ², N E Harrison ², S A Ayeni ², A L Okpara ⁸, P Soibi-Harry ¹, H O Ngwu ⁹, C C Makwe ^1 10, E O Ugwu ¹¹, J I Achara ¹¹, J A Olamijulo ^1 10, S Garba ², R Garba ¹, S I Omisakin ^1 10