Apparent primary follicle-stimulating hormone deficiency is a rare cause of treatable male infertility

Objective: To find the underlying defect in a case of primary FSH deficiency and to estimate the beneficial effect of FSH treatment. Design: Case report. Setting: University hospital fertility clinic. Patient(s): Normal, healthy, 37-year-old male patient with severe oligoteratozoospermia. Intervention(s): Levels of FSH, LH, LHRH provocation test, karyotyping, genomic analysis on the Y-chromosomal AZF region and sequencing of the FSHB gene, FSH treatment. Main Outcome Measure(s): We compiled detailed clinical and molecular data on four pregnancies. We compare this case with a similar case published recently. Result(s): There were detectable but very low FSH levels after LHRH provocation; the LH response was not entirely normal, and no genomic abnormalities were found in the FSHB gene. The FSH treatment resulted in four pregnancies, two of which ended in abortion; the other two resulted in the birth of two healthy children. Both our case and the published case had detectable but abnormally low FSH levels on some occasions, but normal or highly normal inhibin B levels that differed from the expected low levels. Both patients had a normal male phenotype and no detectable mutation in the FSHB gene. The published case differed from our patient in that the published case was azoospermic whereas ours was extremely oligoteratozoospermic. The beneficial effect of FSH treatment was only shown in our patient. Conclusion(s): The published case and ours may have a common, as yet unidentified, underlying defect. The dramatic and immediate effect of FSH treatment on our patient's fertility was clearly demonstrated

Resultaten van in-vitrofertilisatie in Nederland, 1996-2000

OBJECTIVE: To describe the annual results in all 13 Dutch in vitro fertilisation (IVF) centres in the period 1996-2000, and to look for possible differences between individual centres and years. DESIGN: Retrospective data collection, description and analysis. METHOD: The results collected on the website of the Dutch Society of Obstetrics and Gynaecology (Dutch acronym: NVOG; www.nvog.nl) in the period 1996-2000 were integrated and described, with special attention to possible differences between centres and years. RESULTS: In 1996-2000 (5 years), 63,414 IVF or ICSI treatment cycles were started in the Netherlands, and 5,884 transfers of cryopreserved embryos were performed. The number of treatment cycles increased over the years, particularly the number of ICSI cycles. The total number of ongoing pregnancies was 12,991 (20.5% per started cycle; 22.5% for ICSI and 18.3% for IVF). Particularly during the first 3 years, there was an increase in these percentages (IVF: from 16.4% (1996) to 19.2% (1998); ICSI: from 18.3% (1996) to 23.9% (1998)). There were differences between the centres in both the percentage of ongoing pregnancies per started IVF/ICSI cycle (range 13.7-25.1%) and the percentage ICSI (14-61%) and cryo-transfers per total number of treatment cycles (0-26%). It was estimated that, during this 5-year period, 1 out of every 61 Dutch neonates resulted from IVF or ICSI. CONCLUSION: The pregnancy-rates after IVF and ICSI increased during the study period, and were comparable with the rates in other European countries. Some important data are still missing from the inventory, for example regarding the number of embryos per transfer, multiple pregnancies, live births, congenital malformations and complication

Subfertile men with constitutive chromosome abnormalities do not necessarily refrain from intracytoplasmic sperm injection treatment: a follow-up study on 75 Dutch patients

A follow-up study was performed to investigate the impact of the detection of a chromosome abnormality in infertile men who are candidates for intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) treatment. In this collaborative study between clinical genetics centres and fertility clinics in the Netherlands, 75 ICSI couples of which the male partners had a chromosome abnormality were included. All couples were extensively counselled on the risk of having a chromosomally unbalanced child. Forty-two out of 75 couples chose to proceed with the ICSI treatment. So far, treatment has resulted in a pregnancy in 11 cases. Four of them opted to have invasive prenatal diagnosis. Despite the genetic risks related to a chromosome abnormality in infertile men, a small majority (56%) of the couples did not refrain from the ICSI treatment