Publications scientifiques

Is obesity deleterious to male fertility potential ?
Date de parution: 21/12/2011

Belloc S1; de Mouzon J2; Lichtblau I1; Cohen-Bacrie M1; Alvarez S3; Cohen Bacrie P1.
1-ART Unit, laboratoire d’Eylau-Unilabs, Paris, France
2-INSERM, GH Cochin, S. de Gynécologie Obstétrique II et Médecine de la Reproduction, Université Paris Descarte, Paris, France
3-ART Unit, Clinique de la Muette, Paris, France

Is obesity deleterious to male fertility potential ?

OBJECTIVES
Obesity is a well established risk factor for many diseases (hypertension, diabetes…).
In women, obesity is frequently related to ovarian function troubles. In men, obesity has been shown to be associated to a decrease in testosterone levels.
However, its impact on semen quality has been scarcely studied, with few publications.
We analysed, on an important sample, the relationship
between semen parameters and Body Mass index (BMI), recorded at the time of examination.!

MATERIAL and METHODS  
Contact : [email protected]
Printed by We have led a retrospective study of an observational cohort of 5874 spermograms
in a private ART Unit.

Self-reported men height and weight values have been recorded at each spermogram since October 2010 and until April 15, 2011. In case of several measurements, only the first one was included in the study, allowing to compare 400 obese men (BMI > 30 Kg/m2) and 3415 normal weight men (18-25 Kg/m2).
The following parameters were analyzed :

• semen volume
• sperm concentration
• total sperm count
• motility (overall, progressive, non
• progressive)
• vitality
• normal morphology (WHO criteria).

Men’s age was also entered. Statistical analysis was performed using variance, chi-square, and multivariate logistic models. P< 0.05 was considered statistically significant.

RESULTS
The rate of azoospermia increased from 1.0% to 3.8% between normal and obese men (p<0.01).
Semen volume decreased from 3.3 ± 1.6 to 3.0 ± 1.6 ml (p<0.001) between normal and obese men, sperm concentration from 60.9 ± 61.9 to 48.8 ± 53.8 millions/ml (p<0.001), and total sperm count from 184 ± 194 to 135 ± 157 millions sperm cells (p<0.001). A similar decrease was found for overall motility (39.8 ± 16.6 vs. 36.8 ± 14.7 %) and progressive motility (36.8 ± 16.7 vs. 33.5 ±
15.0 % p<0.001). Logistic models including men’s age (strongly related to BMI and sperm concentration) confirmed the results of monovariate analysis.

CONCLUSIONS
Sperm production is clearly altered in obese men quantitatively (sperm count) and qualitatively (motility). Male obesity needs to be taken into account in infertility diagnosis.