Hello ladies,

We have just got the results of our SA and all was good except morphology at 8% (they like to see more that 15%). I have had a look on the web (as you do with these things) and found some interesting bits of info that I thought that I would share..

The first was on a doctors blog click for link which said that when testing sperm they like to see more that 14% but that the average is 2-6%! He says that "over the past 20 years, the andrologists (those who look at sperm)have been getting pickier and pickier, and now a man is lucky if his morphology is over 5%, and almost everyone is less than 14%. Obviously this has all gone too far. We are telling almost all men that their sperm is abnormal, and that just can’t be.""

The second was a study of sperm quality with varying periods of abstinence, which I know comes up on various threads. click for link This showed that "the average numbers of sperm with normal morphology also peaked from between 1 and 2 days of abstinence, then fell, so abstinence beyond 4 days should not be recommended so as to contain the deterioration in sperm morphology related to a prolonged abstinence period"

So, my question is, if the average is supposedly 2-6% and you are lucky to have over 5% what values have people reading this had and how long had they abstained for? Im begining to think that 8% is not too bad, or am I just being naive?!?

My OH's is 13%. Doctor didn't seem too worried by it. Said it was lower than "the average of men he sees" but it should be OK.

Great post, hoping lots of people answer. We have 8% too and my FS said:
"The sperm sample was not great but not so bad. There is definitely a chance of spontaneous conception. The morphology was indeed 8%, it should be 14%. If is more then 5% then there is still a good chance of spontaneous conception."
I like how he said "good chance", so I am going with that!

I have read too that everything over 4% means that conception is possible especially if the count and motility is good. Ours came back at 4%, but then I read that if you don't bd for more than 2-3 days, this will affect morphology. We did bd for 5 days before we did the test, which is typical as it is very rare that we would not bd for that long normally! We are doing another sample next month and hope that it will come back at a bit higher, although in our case, count did come a bit low too. Saying that, I did get pg last May, so it is possible!

I would say that with 8%, it might take a little longer but it is not a problem.

My DH's morphology was 4%, which our RE said was low. I totally believe if you abstain too long it will affect morphology. We got that number after abstaining for more than 4 days. Unfortunately we didn't have another test after abstaining a shorter amount of time.

We were told all SA results were normal and weren't given the numbers. It wasn't until I asked for the print out a few months ago that we saw the DH's was 6%. I don't think it's too low but am going to check with the FS next month. The conclusion of my research so far is that it could be higher but not to worry!!

Oooh thanks for all of your replies, it will be interesting as more people add to the post x

We abstained for 5 days and got the 8%. We have been asked to repeat in 6 weeks so plan to leave it 2 days before taking sample this time to see what that gives us.

we're 6% also - FS just asked us to repeat the test again before our next appointment. His secretary didn't seem too worried though.

Thank you very much fluffy for the link to this study. Very interesting. We abstained for 5 days, and although motility was good at 65%, count was a bit low at 18m and morphology 4%. I'm not expecting miracles, but this is encouraging that if we abstain 2 days, we might see a slight improvement with count and morphology. We will know next month.

OH SA result was 2% and that was after 6 days of abstinence. We don't usually leave it that long either but after numerous opinions from docs and clinics I was told abstinence doesn't affect morphology. That was the one thing I was clinging onto was the fact that maybe that affected it. We were told with 2% it was possible to get a BFP but how long that would take could be anything from a month to 10 years!

We decided we couldn't wait that long and endure the stress so we're on the journey to starting ICSI in April.

xx