Home infertility , Male Fertility , sperm Carnitine Supplement Helps Sperm Swim

Carnitine Supplement Helps Sperm Swim

Catherine McDiarmid-Watt | Tuesday, April 30, 2013 | 0 comments

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Taking carnitine supplements seems to improve sperm mobility in men with poorly active sperm, a problem known as asthenozoospermia, Italian researchers report.

However, for carnitine to work, tiny structures within the cell called mitochondria must function properly.

Mitochondria are important because they provide the energy needed for sperm to move their tail and "swim."

Senior investigator Dr. Carlo Foresta told Reuters Health that "it is well known that in some asthenozoospermic subjects an improvement of sperm (motion occurs) after carnitine administration...However in other asthenozoospermic patients this effect is not present."

To investigate further, Foresta of the University of Padua and colleagues studied 30 asthenozoospermic men divided into two groups depending on whether they had normal or abnormal mitochondria function.

The researchers' findings appear in the medical journal Fertility and Sterility.

In patients with normal mitochondria function, movement rose from 29.3 percent before treatment to 41.1 percent after 3 months of carnitine.

However, in those with abnormal function, movement held steady at about 24 percent.

Thus, Foresta concluded that carnitine treatment is useful "in ameliorating sperm motility only when optimal...mitochondrial function ... is conserved."

SOURCE: Fertility and Sterility 2005.

Photo credit: egg + sperm = eraserhead,
by M Anina / Marioanima, on Flickr
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TODAY'S BOOK SUGGESTION:

Image: Acupuncture and IVF: Increase IVF Success by 40-60%, by Lifang Liang. Publisher: Blue Poppy Press (August 2003)

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Category: infertility, Male Fertility, sperm

About Catherine: I am mom to three grown sons, two grandchildren and two rescue dogs. After years of raising my boys as a single mom, I remarried a wonderful man who had never had a child of his own. Unexpectedly, I found myself pregnant at 49!
Sadly we lost that precious baby at 8 weeks, and decided to try again. Five more losses, turned down for donor egg, foster care and adoption due to my age and losses - we have accepted that there will be no more babies in our house.

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