High Sperm Count but Low Sperm Quality

[ShShShSh]

My husband has just had the results of his seman analysis tests and it has been confirmed that he has a good sperm count but the quality of the sperm in the sample was poor. He has been advised to go for restesting in a few weeks.

Has anyone had any experience of this?

Thanks

Yes, we have high count and motility, low morphology. Our consultant said this sort of balances out, but not that much. I think there are a lot of unknowns with sperm. Hopefully your repeat test will be better. How long had he abstained last time?

Hi,

Thanks for responding.

The test was on Monday and he had abstained since Thursday.

What did your consultant mean re it "balancing out". Is there anything that can be done to help this?

How long have you been TTC?

hi ShShShSh, we also have low morphology (1%) and motility(5%), but high count (75million). They didn't want to take this as final until a second analysis had been undertaken however. Unfortunately this came back as confirmation of the first results, despite our efforts to improve it.

If he goes back for re-testing, it is best to leave at about 3 months as it takes this long for new sperm to be created.

Had he been ill at all in the three months leading up to the test being taken? This can affect the results.

I meant that if you have a high count, eg geek has 75 where 20,is 'normal' but have a lower % of normal sperm, then overall quantities of decent sperm might be the same. But I imagine the duffers getting in the way, but who knows.

I think you should do the test in a couple of weeks, but if still bad leave it three months, as geek said. Unfortunately nothing we've been doing has improved things either, and dh is very healthy.

Good luck

I see what you mean now keep it going. Our doc said similiar. I don't know the % morphology but the sperm count was 170 million so the doctor seemed to say that because the sperm levels were so high that there were still plenty to work with but to wait until after the second test before we discuss any issues as it can change from test to test.

He hasn't been ill over the last 3 months but he has been doing a lot of cycling (150km per week and then a race of over 250km) which I think could have had an impact. That has all finished now so we'll see what happens.

We had the exact same. Plenty of them but not many going the right way.
Went back today to get results done of a test taken 6 months later and they where much higher than normal. In fact the motility had gone from 25% to 50% and the morphology had got up from 5% to 14% (the doctor said that morphology in very rarely in double figures).

Nothing done differently except DH taking a regular multi-vitamin since the first test. Also he is vegetarian and doesn't smoke and rarely drinks.

I may have got those figures the wrong way round but the upshot of it all is that the results went from 'hmm, well I guess it's OK' to 'damn fella you got some supermen going on there'.

Sorry you are going through this - getting results back is never a pleasant experience when they don't meet so called 'perfect standards'.

Lots can be done - My dh had 3- 4 % morphology and motility which rose from about 25 - 40 %. And like yourselves very high count. Overall, better to have loads of them - as at least there are some - if that makes sense.

I think you are right about serious cycling having an impact. Make sure he takes a good multi vit - there is a pre-conception one for men too, also omega 3 oils and my favourite tip = loads and loads of tomato juice, or tomato sauce based meals such as spag bol or tomato soup etc. The lycopene does something to the sperm.

Try and find out what the morphology and motility figures are so you know if he has boderline issues or more severe -as other have said these things also fluctuate.

My gut feeling with DH was that although morphology was low, he wouldn't be producing so many if the production line was that faulty.

Good luck

When we had DHs first results he had twice the average count but half the average % that were good, as it were. Now in my book that makes it fine. I think of it like this:
Imagine Mr Average has 100 sperm (small numbers that are easy to work with) and 50% of them are built right and going where they need to. That means that 50 of his 100 are doing what is required, so 50 is normal.
Now your DH has 200 sperm and 25% of them are doing what is required. Now 25% of 200 is 50. So he too has 50 sperm doing what they should be.
Yes as a percentage it is half the normal amount but when you look at it as actual numbers the net result is the same.
(can you tell I'm a maths teacher)

Moreover, it only takes one.

I just think that the world of sperm is still a mystery in science and they just dont know.

My DH was tested as having sperm quality issues. We eventually had IVF and were planning to go for ICSI - the lab phoned us on the morning of conception and asked us if we really wanted ICSI as they could see no issue with sperm quality.

It just takes one

This is a great blog

infertilityblog.blogspot.co.uk/

He has a posting pre-2007 (ie in the days when I was an avid reader of the blog) about sperm quality - may take a bit of time to find it.

Sorry - to keep posting.

But I found that if you put "morphology" in the search bar of that blog - you get quite a few interesting entries come up.

Thank you for all of the replies. All of the information is very useful.

I would be keen to know the percentages to exactly what we are dealing with and will make sure we get these for the next tests.

Pipbin & Sarlat- thats really great news that the numbers/increased so much since the first test.

Butheneverdid - glad to hear everthing turned out well for you too!

I will let you know what the outcome is when he has the next test in a few weeks.

DH had to do various samples at various intervals during our 5 IVF cycles.. it seemed to vary a great deal, times when he'd been 'healthy' and stopped drinking and smoking it actually was worse then times when he was relaxed and we didn't stress it was better.

We were told it was very varying. I'm not sure you have to leave it 3 months to re-test.

The fertility clinic told me that we should redo it after 3 months as it would seem that sperm refresh on a three month cycle.