High pregnancy and delivery rates after IVF-ICSI can be achieved using cryopreserved sperm from patients with malignant cancer, researchers have reported.

The specialists from centers in Tel-Hashomer and Tel-Aviv, Israel, and New York, USA, performed a retrospective study of 118 consecutive couples who had undergone IVF-ICSI using sperm that had been banked before the male partner underwent treatment for malignant cancer (the sperm had been collected and cryopreserved immediately after the cancer diagnosis was made). The couples were identified from reviewing records relating to the 11-year period from January 1994 to April 2005.

The three most frequent types of cancer experienced by the male partners were testicular cancer (40 percent of the men in the study), lymphomas (31 percent), and prostate cancer (8.5 percent). The mean age at diagnosis was 31.4 years (range 11.9-68.8 years).

The 118 couples underwent a total of 169 IVF-ICSI cycles using pretreatment cryopreserved sperm. The mean sperm count before cancer treatment was 66.5 x 1000000/mL; after thawing the mean sperm count was 40.9 x 1000000/mL. The average motility was 45.6 percent before treatment; after thawing the average motility was 14.2 percent.

Overall, the clinical pregnancy rate was 56.8 percent per retrieval – a total of 96 pregnancies from the 169 cycles. These led to 126 births and 11 spontaneous abortions.

The researchers observed that the clinical pregnancy rate was lowest when the male partner had prostate cancer, rather than other malignancies. The clinical pregnancy rate was 18.2 percent in couples where the male partner had prostate cancer, compared with 58.0 percent with testicular cancer and 60.7 percent with other malignancies. Prostate cancer was also associated with lower pre-freezing semen parameters such as volume, sperm count and motility, compared with the other types of malignancy.

Discussing their results in a paper due to be published in the journal Fertility and Sterility, the researchers (Hourvitz et al) note that the achieved overall clinical pregnancy rate of 56.8 percent is similar to the average pregnancy rate achieved with other male-factor patients.

They suggest that it is of “crucial importance” that all newly diagnosed cancer patients be advised to cryopreserve their sperm as early as possible, and certainly before starting treatment.

Concluding, the researchers write: “Our 11 years’ experience with ICSI in male cancer survivors shows great promise. The high success rate achieved with cryopreserved-thawed sperm should encourage all physicians involved in cancer care to offer cryopreservation to all men of reproductive age before initiating anti-neoplastic therapy.”

Your views? Please use the Comment button below to give us your feedback on any aspect of this article.

To be notified of the contents of new ORGYN.com Reviews as they are published, and to receive direct links to the articles, you can subscribe to the email update via the “Edit profile” page (click on the link, above right).

ORGYN.com