Credit: womenshealth.gov

MONDAY July 7, 2008 (foodconsumer.org) -- Men over the age of 40 are less able to impregnate their wives and they may increase the risk of miscarriages, according to a French study presented at the 24th annual conference of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology Monday July 7.

Men's age has been suspected for long to affect pregnancy, but clinical evidence is rare.   Dr. Stéphanie Belloc, of the Eylau Centre for Assisted Reproduction, Paris, France, said their research is the first to provide some evidence that men's age does have an impact on reproductive outcomes.

The findings were based on a follow-up of 21239 intrauterine inseminations (IUIs), not the normal way for husbands to make their wives pregnant. This means that the results may not be applicable to the situation out of clinics.

For the study, Dr. Belloc and colleagues analyzed data for 12,236 couples who visited the Centre between January 2002 and December 2006 and semen used for inseminations came from husbands only.

The doctors examined the sperm of each man at the time of the IUI for a number of characteristics such as sperm count, motility and morphology.   And clinical pregnancy, miscarriage and delivery rates were recorded.   They analyzed the association between the sperm quality and the pregnancy outcomes among these couples.

Wives of men over the age of 40 had lower rate of pregnancy and high rate of miscarriage, the researchers found.  

Women age 40 or older had a pregnancy rate of 8.9 percent compared to 14.5 percent in younger women, which is expected as maternal impact on the reproductive outcome has been known for long.   Miscarriage rate was also found higher among women who were older.

A health observer affiliated with foodconsumer.org commented that age surely affects the sperm quality, but the findings may not be applicable to healthy men who impregnate their wives naturally.

He pointed out that in most cases involved in the study the couples were being treated because of the husband's infertility, meaning that that the men had some problem with their reproductive system in the first place.

However, there should be no doubt that older men have more abnormal sperm than younger men.   Studies have reported that as a man ages, many environmental factors, diet and lifestyle such as use of laptop would affect the quality of his sperm.

Men regardless of their age who want to have super sperm should consider using a diet full of zinc, vitamin C, E, B12, arginine, cartinine, selenium, lycopene and folate.  They also better avoid sugar, white flour, caffeine, processed food, and alcohol.