Testicular cancer and Hodgking's disease: evaluation of semen quality
Gandini
L., Lombardo F., Salacone P. Paoli D., Anselmo A.P., Culasso F.,
Dondero F., Lenzi A.
Human Reproduction, 18: 796-801, 2003 |
The aim of our study tovas to establish whether there is a difference
in semen quality bet-ween puatients wiyth testicular cancer (TC)
and Hodgkin's disease (HD). Methods. We evaluated 342 paìtients
affected by TC(n=232) or HD (110) who cryobanked sperm before
initiating chemo-or radiotherapy. All TC patients were evaluated
1 month after orchidectomy. Results. A total of 14 patients were
azoospermic or cryptozoospermic. In the TC group (n = 222) the
mean of the semen parameters was normal according to the World
Health Organization (1992). However, dividing g thie cases into
total sperm count >40X10 6 /ejaculate and <40X10 6 /ejaculate,
35.5 % of the patients showed an impaired semen quaity. The quality
of sperm parameters was higher in seminoma patients than for the
other histological groups. A significant difference for all semen
variables was observed betweenì patients with serum ßhCG
levels classified as pathological(>5 mIU/ml) and those with
normal serum ßhCG. Comparison of semen parameters between
TC stages I and II showed no significant differences. In the HD
group (n = 106), we found that by and large they shiowed normal
spermatogenesis, with only 24.5% having a total sperm count <40X10
6 /ejaculate. There was a significant decrease in semen quality
in stages III and IV or HD. Conclusions: Better semen quality
was observed in patients with HD than in those with TC. The semen
qualitàobserved in our TC and HD groups seems better than
previous results reported in the literature.
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