Clinical Outcome of Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection in Infertile Men With Treated and Untreated Clinical Varicocele

Purpose: We evaluated the impact of varicocelectomy on intracytoplasmic sperm

injection outcomes in infertile men with clinical varicocele.

Materials and Methods: We studied 242 infertile men with a history of clinical

varicocele who underwent intracytoplasmic sperm injection. Of the men 80 underwent prior subinguinal microsurgical varicocelectomy (treated group 1) and

162 had any grade of clinical varicocele (untreated group 2) at sperm injection.

We compared semen analysis results before and after varicocelectomy, and the

sperm injection procedure outcomes. Mean time from surgery to sperm injection

was 6.2 months. Logistic regression was done to verify whether varicocelectomy

influenced the odds of clinical pregnancy, live birth and miscarriage.

Results: We noted an improved total number of motile sperm (6.7 X 10^6

vs 15.4 X 10^6, p = 0.01) and a decreased sperm defect score (2.2 vs 1.9, p =
0.01) after vs

before varicocele repair. The clinical pregnancy (60.0% vs 45.0%, p =
0.04) and

live birth (46.2% vs 31.4%, p =
0.03) rates after the sperm injection procedure

were higher in the treated than in the untreated group. The chance of achieving

clinical pregnancy (OR 1.82; 95% CI 1.06 –3.15) and live birth (OR 1.87, 95% CI

1.08 –3.25) by the sperm injection procedure were significantly increased while

the chance of miscarriage was decreased (OR 0.433, 95% CI 0.22– 0.84) after

varicocele was treated.

Conclusions: Results suggest that varicocelectomy improves clinical pregnancy

and live birth rates by intracytoplasmic sperm injection in infertile couples in

which the male partner has clinical varicocele. The chance of miscarriage may be decreased if varicocele is treated before assisted reproduction.