Fertility Rates Boosted by Surgery

A fertility specialist at Taipei Veterans General Hospital (TVGH) on Monday said that while about one in every 10 men might have infertility problems, the use of microsurgical testicular sperm extraction (mTESE) can helped increase fertility rates.

The hospital cited a recent case of a 33-year-old man, surnamed Yu , who was diagnosed with azoospermia — the absence of motile (and hence viable) sperm in semen — and was told by doctors at other hospitals that there no hope of impregnating his partner.

However, a team of doctors at TVGH were able to retrieve sperm from Yu’s right testicle via mTESE, and the couple recently gave birth through in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment.

TVGH Division of Male Reproductive Medicine director William Huang, who performed the surgery, said that about 1 percent to 1.5 percent of males in Taiwan suffer from azoospermia.

Azoospermia can be categorized into obstructive and non-obstructive forms. Obstructive azoospermia means that the individual can produce sperm, but that none are present in the ejaculate, while non-obstructive azoospermia relates to abnormal sperm production within the testes, Huang said

“Non-obstructive azoospermia is one of the most challenging problems to deal with in male infertility and relies on mTESE for treatment,” he said.

Using the mTESE method, doctors can use magnification of up to 24 times to search for areas with increased sperm count to collect sperm for IVF treatment.

“The main feature of mTESE, compared with the traditional method of testicular biopsy, lies in its precision,” Huang said, adding that while a testicular biopsy can be seen as cutting down many trees in a forest and trying to find a few apples within them, mTESE is like precisely locating where the apples are growing, then picking the apples that are needed.

Division statistics showed that the fertility rate of couples with non-obstructive azoospermia after mTESE treatment was 77.52 percent last year, with rates of pregnancy that reached 24 weeks being 39.7 percent, while the 24-week pregnancy rate increased to 50 percent this year, Huang added.

Huang said that the reason for azoospermia is still unknown, but might be related to genetic mutation or environmental influences, such as exposure to high temperaturse, radioactive substances, smoking, drinking alcohol, or consuming unhealthy food.

“I urge men to undergo fertility testing before their partners, because the procedure is not as complicated as it is for women,” he said.

Drinking Green Tea too often may lower Fertility

Are you a green tea lover? Read this carefully as the cup packed with antioxidants and other health benefits may adversely affect your fertility and development in case of frequent use, warn researchers.

In experiments over fruit flies, the team from University of California-Irvine discovered that excessive consumption adversely affected development and reproduction in fruit fly populations. According to them, one should avoid high dose of green tea or any natural product as nutraceuticals such as green tea, while growing in popularity, are largely unregulated.

“While green tea could have health benefits at low doses, our study and others have shown that at high doses, it may have adverse effects,” said Mahtab Jafari, associate professor of pharmaceutical sciences. “Further work is needed to make any definite recommendations but we suggest that green tea should be consumed in moderation,” she added.

Researchers from the University of California-Irvine tested this theory using fruit flies. They found that excessive consumption affected the development and reproduction of the fruit fly population. According to the team, anyone should at least avoid consuming a high dose of green tea or any products with nutraceuticals which are popular are usually unregulated. Mahtab Jafari, associate professor of pharmaceutical sciences said, "While green tea could have health benefits at low doses, our study and others have shown that at high doses, it may have adverse effects. Further work is needed to make any definite recommendations but we suggest that green tea should be consumed in moderation."

For the study, Jafari and colleagues investigated the effects of green tea toxicity on the development and reproduction in fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster. Embryos and larvae were subjected to various doses of green tea polyphenols.

Larvae exposed to 10mg of green tea were slower to develop, were born smaller and exhibited a dramatic decline in the number of emerged offspring. Ten milligrams of green tea made the flies more susceptible to starvation and heat stress but protected them against dehydration.

Female offspring showed decreased reproductive output and a 17 per cent reduction in lifespan while males were unaffected, the study found. Ten milligrams of green tea caused morphological abnormalities in reproductive organs such as testicular and ovarian atrophy. Jafari believes that high doses of green tea may cause “too much” apoptosis or cell death.

Derived from the plant Camellia sinensis, green tea is popular worldwide for its purported brain and heart health and anti-cancer properties. Jafari noted that in other tests with mice and dogs, green tea compounds in large amounts dramatically reduced body weight and, in mice, negatively affected embryo development.

“We are planning to measure total consumption and identify and quantify the metabolites of natural products in flies,” Jafari pointed out, adding that these experiments will enable us to have a better understanding of toxic doses in humans. The paper appeared in the Journal of Functional Foods.