Antioxidants, Diet and Sperm

June 6th, 2010 § Comments Off on Antioxidants, Diet and Sperm § permalink

Can diet help sperm production?  We are what we eat, and the sperm factory is such an active one that it would be strange if diet didn’t affect sperm one way or another.

Antioxidants protect the body from free radicals, which are released from unstable compounds as they break down and damage molecules in cells.  (I’ve always loved the phrase “free radical,” which conjures images of 1960s miscreants running amok inside the body.)  Antioxidants soak up these bad actors and prevent their misdeeds.  But knowing which antioxidants work and in what dose is still being learned.  I discussed Coenzyme Q10, which may function as an antioxidant, in a previous post.

Jaime Mendiola and colleagues reported in the March issue of Fertility and Sterility that men with a lower intake of carbohydrates, fiber, folate, vitamin C and lycopene and a higher intake of protein and total fat had worse sperm than men with the opposite diet. I’d of course like to see studies which involve giving specific antioxidants first and then measuring sperm improvement relative to a placebo, but this is a promising start.

Bottom line: if you’re worried about your sperm, a diet higher in fiber, folate, vitamin C and lycopene, and lower in fat can’t hurt.

New Nuts and Bolts

June 3rd, 2010 § Comments Off on New Nuts and Bolts § permalink

Hi Everybody,

I’ve been doing some updates to the blog, and now have a new look if you’re reading this on an iPhone, iPod touch, Android, Blackberry or other web enabled mobile device.  Check it out:

iphone.png

Enjoy!

Vitamins and Sperm

June 1st, 2010 § 15 comments § permalink

Adam recently asked about a product which claimed to improve semen.  There are many of those out there, and many are vitamins and combinations of vitamins.  These “nutraceuticals” can be found in drug stores, in groceries, on the internet and elsewhere.

A big problem with claims about how a nutraceutical may improve sperm and semen is that most aren’t based on studies that have a placebo, a pill that looks just like the vitamin but doesn’t have the ingredients being studied.  Why is that a problem?  Because nature virtually guarantees that if you start out with a bunch of men that happen to have lower than average sperm or whatever, and you measure their sperm (or whatever) before and after treatment, they will always improve.  It’s an effect called “regression to the mean.”  It’s like if you took twenty people with colds and gave them all a pill and waited two weeks, most would get better.  Was it due to the pill or to just nature doing its thing?  You don’t know.  The way to figure it out would be to give half of them the pill, and half of them a pill that looked like that one but had no active ingredients, and compare how the two groups did over that two weeks.  That’s called a “controlled study,” and it’s critical in figuring out if a drug or vitamin works.

Last year, two controlled studies were published looking at a vitamin involved in the energy machine inside cells called “Coenzyme Q10” and sperm.  In one, men with poorly wiggling sperm who took 200 mg daily improved while taking the vitamin compared to men taking placebo.  In another, men taking 300 mg daily improved in both sperm number and motility compared to men taking placebo.

They’re small studies, and bigger studies are always better.  But Coenzyme Q10 might help sperm numbers and especially motility. (I have absolutely no relationship, financial or otherwise, to companies that make it.)

Timing Sex

May 27th, 2010 § 9 comments § permalink

If you’re trying to get pregnant, something useful to know is how often to have sex.  Sperm counts peak at two to three days after ejaculation, meaning, after you have sex (or masturbate,) the swimmers will be most abundant two to three days later.  Sperm live for about 48 hours in the female reproductive tract, so the optimum timing is sex every other day.

However, don’t freak out if you have an especially romantic weekend with a little extra frequent activity, or get caught up and miss a few days.  Stressing out about sex is counter productive, as stress itself can result in poorer sperm quality.

I’m often asked when during the month (or cycle) a couple should try to conceive.  Studies show that conception usually happens up to six days before, and ending on, ovulation.  The big problem is that all tests for ovulation show the event after it happens.  So a good plan is start having sex every other day after menstruation ends, and keep going until the next menstruation.

So, soldier on.  Have sex every other day.  Doctors orders.

Lube

May 24th, 2010 § Comments Off on Lube § permalink

Just about everything outside the female reproductive tract kills sperm, including lubricants.  But sometimes lubricant is desirable during sex.  In 2008, an independent lab at the Cleveland Clinic headed by Ashok Agarwal published in the journal of Fertility and Sterility a comparison of different lubricants and how they degrade sperm movement and the DNA that the sperm contains.  Of Pre-Seed, FemGlide, Astroglide, and Replens, Pre-Seed was the one that didn’t seem to have much negative effect on sperm motion and DNA.  So, if you’re going to use lubricant during sex and you want to conceive, Pre-Seed seems to be a good choice.  (I have absolutely no relationship, financial or otherwise, to the company that makes it.)

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