PREVALENCE OF ANTISPERM ANTIBODIES BY SPERMMARTEST IN SUBJECTS UNDERGOING A ROUTINE SPERM ANALYSIS FOR INFERTILITY

To evaluate the prevalence of antisperm antibodies (ASA) attached to t he sperm plasma membrane in male partners of infertile couples, the bi nding of latex particles to spermatozoa was investigated using SpermMA Rtest, included routinely in semen analysis. A total of 860 men were e xamined, who were referred consecutively for semen analysis. Of these, 750 men were referred because of infertility (O.6-10 years in duratio n) whereas 110 were volunteers with a history of previous fertility. S amples were assessed by the SpermMARtest kit using late x particles se nsitized with human IgG. Sperm-latex binding was read after 3 min and samples scored as negative, positive or highly positive when < 10, > 1 0-40, or > 40% binding occurred, respectively. Of the samples 132 (17. 3%) were excluded because of azoo- or severe oligo-asthenozoospermia I gG attached to spermatozoa were detected in nearly 13% of semen sample s from the infertile population and in one of 110 fertile men (0.9%). From the infertile group, 6.2% of samples showed > 40% binding, and 6. 7% intermediate binding, with an overall ASA prevalence of 12.9% in su bjects undergoing semen analysis for infertility.