Sperm Count, Morphology and Motility After Unilateral Mumps Orchitis

Abstract

In earlier studies carried out between 1951 and 1970, a total of 298 patients with mumps orchitis were examined in the Sexological Institute in Prague (Bart\l=a'\k, Nedoma & Mirovsk\l=y'\,1955; Sk\l=a' \lov\l=a' \,Bart\l=a'\k & Neva\l=r%v\ilov\l=a' \,1966; Bart\l=a'\k, Sk\l=a'\lov\l=a'\& Neva\l=r%v\ilov\l=a' \,1968). This number included 178 adults between 19 and 53, and 120 youths between 13 and 18 years of age. The findings can be summarized as follows. (1) Adults suffered more frequently (29%) than youths (13%) from bilateral orchitis. (2) Ejaculates were examined within 1 to 3 months following bilateral or unilateral orchitis. Spermiogenesis was severely disrupted in 50% of the patients, giving rise to oligospermia, necrospermia and azoospermia. Clinical signs of damage to the testes (diminished testicular volume, painfulness, poor consistency) were manifest in this period in 40 % of the youths and 55 % of the adults. Later, 25 % of the patients showed some degree of persistent atrophy of the affected gonads. Severe atrophy, with a considerable reduction in the size of the testes, was quite exceptional and was always found to be correlated with deterioration in spermatogenesis. Persistently poor fertility was found in many patients whose testes were not atrophie. (3) A correlation was found to exist between the severity of the orchitis and the prognosis of recovery in 60 % of patients regardless of their ages. In the remainder, however, recovery was more protracted in the younger patients, whilst normal seminal characteristics were recovered more quickly in the adults, even after a severe attack of orchitis. (4) Bilateral orchitis makes the return of normal seminal characteristics much less likely but does not preclude its possibility. Even 3 years after unilateral orchitis, at least 24% of adults and 38% of youths had abnormal ejaculates. The observations stated above do not, however, answer the question of whether mumps orchitis affects the ejaculate in all its qualities equally or whether the various recovery processes occur in parallel. The present com¬ munication presents a brief survey of the changes occurring in three basic characteristics of the ejaculate, i.e. sperm count, morphology and motility, following an attack of orchitis. Ejaculates from fifty-four patients were examined within 3, 6 and 12 months of an attack of unilateral mumps orchitis. The ejaculates of patients who underwent all three examination tests in the periods mentioned above were included, when the volume of the ejaculate was greater than 1-5 ml, and sperm motility was investigated by the Sperm Velocity Test (SVT) according to the method of Hynie (Hynie & Barták, 1967) within 1, 3 and 5 hr of ejaculation.

Viruses in the Mammalian Male Genital Tract and Their Effects on the Reproductive System

“…Mumps is caused by an RNA virus of the paramyxovirus group. In prepubertal boys, the symptoms of mumps are usually limited to infectious parotitis, but, in men, orchitis is the most common complication (29,34). Orchitis develops in 5 to 37% of all adult patients infected with mumps (120).…”

“…Within the first few days of infection, the virus directly attacks the testes, destroying the testicular parenchyma (44,242) and decreasing androgen production (4). This accounts for the testicular atrophy observed in 40 to 70% of patients with orchitis (29,34). Unilateral involvement is the most common, while bilateral involvement occurs in 15 to 30% of the patients with orchitis (201).…”

Preventable causes of male infertility

“…The resulting inflammation within the inelastic tunica albuginea causes swelling, further pressure necrosis, and cell death. Conservative treatment of mumps orchitis consisting of analgesics, bed rest, and elevation of the scrotum results in testicular atrophy in 40%-70°70 of cases and in sterility in 30% -87% of men [5,7], although a recent series of conservatively treated, mild cases of mumps orchitis reported no incidence of sterility [99]. Burhans [12] and Nixon et al [79] reported that early incision of the tunica albuginea and drainage of the hydrocele to relieve the pressure necrosis of the testicle decreased the incidence of testicular atrophy but failed to prevent sterility in 12%0-30% of patients.…”

Long-term efficacy and safety of interferon-alpha-2B in patients with mumps orchitis

“…This pathologic process leads to testicular atrophy. Studies performed in different periods reported testicular atrophy rates of 40 and 70% [13,22,23].…”