GEOGRAPHIC DIFFERENCES IN SEMEN QUALITY OF SPANISH INFERTILE PATIENTS
2Reproduction, Zaida Espacio De Salud, Cuenca
3Reproduction, UR Moncloa, Madrid
4Reproduction, UR Vistahermosa, Alicante
5Reproduction, UR Mediterraneo, Almeria
6Reproduction, UR Jerez, Cadiz
7Reproduction, UR El Angel, Malaga
8Reproduction, UR IMED, Valencia
10Reproduction, UR LLeida, Lerida
11Reproduction, UR CEFIVA, Oviedo
12Reproduction, UR La Vega, Murcia
13Reproduction, UR Montpellier, Zaragoza
14Reproduction, UR La Inmaculada, Granada
Introduction
Several studies have been published regarding the correlation between the subject´s geographical location and their semen quality. The main limitations of these studies include differences in protocol across laboratories, which may affect the validity of data.
The objective of this study was to determine whether there are variations in the seminal parameters of patients undergoing a sterility study in eleven different geographical locations in Spain.
Methods
The study was carried out in 11 assisted reproduction units belonging to the same group. A total of 872 semen samples from men who came to perform a semen analysis for a fertility study were analyzed, which included: volume, sperm concentration and total and active motility. Semen parameters were assessed using standardized methodology with inter-laboratory quality control.
At the time of analysis, all the men had a sexual abstinence between 2 and 5 days. The mean age of patients was 38 years (SD:6.14). There were no significant differences regarding age between the different centers (ANOVA p>0.05). Volume, sperm concentration, motility and the total number of motile sperm (TMS): volume x sperm concentration x percentage of motility, were compared according to geographic locations.
Analysis of variance (ANOVA) was performed for the comparison between centers of the means of the values of each parameter and the Chi-square test to compare the percentage of abnormal or pathological diagnoses according to the WHO parameters.
Results
Statistically significant differences were found between the different centers regarding volume, sperm concentration, total motility and TMS (p:0.020, 0.004, 0.001 and 0.008 respectively). Men from Asturias had the highest proportion of volume, sperm concentrtion, motile spermatozoa and TMS with statistically significant differences with respect to the rest, followed by patients from Cataluña, Almeria and Malaga. Lowest sperm concentrtion and TMS were detected for men from Granada, Alicante and Madrid.
Conclusions
Since the determination of the different parameters has been carried out with the same methodology, the differences in semen quality cannot be due to variations between laboratories.
The causes of geographical differences in human sperm quality observed are most likely the result of a combination of various typos of environmental factors.
