Seminal tract inflammation and male infertility. Correlations between leukospermia and clinical history, prostatic cytology, conventional semen parameters, sperm viability and seminal plasma protein composition.

A retrospective clinical evaluation of various types of semen analyses from infertile couples attending our Infertility Clinic was undertaken with the scope of studying the possible correlation between seminal inflammation and infertility. The parameters considered were leukospermia (severe, slight, constant or non-constant), clinical history (anamnestic data possibly inferring inflammation), conventional semen parameters, sperm viability (as assessed by capillary tube in vitro penetration test) and seminal plasma proteins patterns (SDS-PAGE). History data such as dysuria, urinary infection, cystitis symptoms and hematospermia were found to be significantly more frequent in infertile men with than in those without leukospermia. Leukospermia in itself did not seem to affect the conventional semen parameters such as total sperm count, motility (at 45 and 180 min) and/or morphology. The seminal volume could represent an exception to this rule. Furthermore, leukospermia did significantly affect sperm viability as evaluated by the capillary tube penetration test. Leukospermia was also significantly coupled to alterations of the seminal plasma protein composition (increase of the albumin concentration, decrease of prostatic markers and other anomalies).

Anaerobic and aerobic bacteria in secretions of prostate and seminal vesicles of infertile men.

A cytological and bacteriological study was made of prostatic (EPS) and vesicular (EVS) secretions from 123 infertile men who were suspected of having chronic genital tract inflammation and from 31 men with premature ejaculation (1,12,16). In the microbiological investigations samples were inoculated within 10 min on various culture media and incubated under both aerobic and anaerobic conditions. Bacterial loads of more than 10,000 colony-forming units of a single species or genus per milliliter of EPS or EVS were considered to be pathological. In the infertile subjects with proven inflammation of the seminal accessory glands, the EPS and the EVS that gave positive cultures and had bacterial loads defined as pathological contained large numbers of anaerobic or microaerophilic organisms (EPS: 51 of the 63 bacterial strains found, congruent to 81%; EVS: 19 of the 20 bacterial strains found, congruent to 95%).