Male Infertility Causes and Sperm DNA Fragmentation

Causes Of Male Infertility

One of the unexplained causes of male infertility is Sperm DNA Fragmentation Index is also known as Sperm DFI which means out “X” number of sperms how man sperms actually have DNA fragmentation. It reflects the integrity of and the damage to the DNA, the genetic material of the sperm, thereby detecting potential sperm damage. It is considered a crucial indicator in evaluating semen quality.

What is Sperm DNA Fragmentation Index?

Human sperm is a very specialized cell. The human sperm has minimal cytoplasm and has very compact DNA. The structure of sperm includes the head, neck, body, and tail. The DNA is concentrated in the sperm’s head. Human male sperm are exposed to a lot of chemical reactions inside the testes as well in the female reproductive tract. As a part of this complex chemical reaction that occurs, there is the presence of free radical species in the sperm, in common words, it’s called oxidative stress. This oxidative stress can cause damage to sperm DNA which leads to male infertility. In this Sperm DNA fragmentation test or Sperm DNA Fragmentation Index, we study how many sperms have damaged or fragmented DNAs.

Male infertility and sperm DNA fragmentation

Quite some time back Sperm DNA Fragmentation test was not available and at that time lot of male patients despite having normal reports- sperm count, motility, and morphology, despite trying to naturally or through IUI could not conceive, In these situations, it is believed that the patient may have a high amount of DNA fragmentation. As a result of this in order to detect this unexplained male infertility, the Sperm DNA Fragmentation test was invented.

Sperm DNA Fragmentation test

If the sperm DFI is less than 20% in Indian men then it is normal which means 20% of sperms can have damaged DNA so the male can still conceive naturally, but sperm DFI is more than 20% then these males might need the help of Assisted Reproductive Technology. This could be in form of IUI or IVF. It is very important who does your testing? It is a very difficult test and it requires an expert doctor because the preparation of slides is exceedingly important in order to identify Sperm DNA Fragmentation Index correctly.

It sperm DFI can be done with the computer-assisted program as well which is the best way of detecting and declaring the Sperm DNA Fragmentation Index of any male partner.