title: Semen characteristics of 49 fertile males.
abstract: We examined the semen characteristics of 49 men whose partners had conceived within the last 16 weeks. There was considerable variation in the semen results. The % of morphologically ideal forms and the absence of sperm bound antibodies appeared to be the two most important semen characteristics when assessing the fertilising potential of the samples. A large proportion of samples (70%) when compared to the WHO standards of normality, were classed abnormal, however, only 25% of the samples had greater than 2 abnormal characteristics. It is diagnostically more relevant to determine the number of abnormalities within a sample rather than categorising the sample as "normal" or "abnormal".
authors.affiliation: Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, University of Sheffield, Jessop Hospital for Women, U.K.
authors.forename: C L
authors.initials: CL
authors.lastname: Barratt
authors.forename: B C
authors.initials: BC
authors.lastname: Dunphy
authors.forename: E J
authors.initials: EJ
authors.lastname: Thomas
authors.forename: I D
authors.initials: ID
authors.lastname: Cooke
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D006801:Humans; D012016:Reference Values; D012661:Semen / Q000032:analysis*