Low sperm count!! Any experience or advice?

[SpermingHell]

DH and I have been TTC for a while and have been referred to a fertility clinic.

Today we received the SA results for DH and the count was low.

Has anybody had experience of this? How did you cope? Did the sperm count increase with any treatment?

Will they retest DH to see if it was a one off?

Is this the end?

[SlightlyBabyCrazed]

Give him some conception vits - if not already. We use the pregnacare ones, but there are plenty around. Then ban hot baths/showers and too tight trousers/pants.

These are for a start - it takes 3 months to see the benefits as thats how long it takes to generate the little swimmers.

(TMI) - he needs to regular unload them as too many days between reduces the quality.

It is certainly not the end and I'm sure there are plenty more nuggets of advice out there!

[havealittlefaithbaby]

Yes they should definitely retest. DH had that kind of result, they are retesting.again soon.
Various things can affect levels, too.many hot baths (as slightly says) illness in the last 3 months. She is also correct about the conception vits. I initially bought the pregnacare ones. When they ran out I looked at the Tesco wellman pills and they had the same contents for a quarter of the price! The key things that are meant to help are zinc, ginseng and magnesium.
When it comes to ttc some advice suggests if sperm count is low is to.swi slightly less often. I can't quite remember but I think Taking charge of your fertility says to have sex the last day of your fertile fluid...may be tricky to know though!

[Quasimojo]

Did they not advise after the results? My DH had a low result but was told not to worry, that it would probably still happen. It did indeed.

[MissTinaTeaspoon]

Dh had a good count but low normal forms in December...he started taking wellman conception and 1000mg vitamin c and last week all the values, including count, had gone up

Did they give you all the results? Because if his count is low but his normal forms, mobility and motility are really good then that's still a good result because although there are fewer sperm, the ones that there are are of good quality so will reach their target iyswim? It's hard to comment on just one part of a sperm analysis, you need to look at the whole picture.

[SpermingHell]

Thanks for all the advice, i'm definately going to get him some vitamins and he loves having hot baths so will have to limit those.

We've just received the results on paper so far, we have an appt with a consultant in 2 weeks but we're going to book in with our GP next week.

The comments on the results are very low count, recommend a retest so looks like thats the next step.

The other results were ok. Motility was 56% with 16% excellent and 40% sluggish. Morphology was 3%.

[havealittlefaithbaby]

Tina that is very encouraging!
What our GP said is with low count (NHS area/eligibility criteria permitting) they can always 'spin' the sperm to concentrate it then 'introduce' it to the egg (can't remember if he said iui or ivf).

[mrsden]

Your DH will be asked to do another sample because they will not be able to conclude anything from just one because so many things can affect it. It depends on the results of this second sample and how good the motility and morphology is as to what they will recommend and also how low the count is. If the morphology is good then IUI using 'washed' sperm might be a good option. It is definitely worth getting him to take vitamin supplements (vit C, A, E, zinc and selenium), my DH had quite an improved count after taking these although it is still low and because he also has poor morphology it looks like we will need ICSI. But we have been told that ICSI has very good results when used in cases where the male has low count so it is a good option.