Toxicology
Human
Leukocytospermia
The increased presence of leukocytes in the ejaculate may indicate a genital tract infection. Semen from 10 patients with leukocytospermia was analyzed by SCSA. Leukocytospermia was directly correlated with an increase in immature germ cell concentration and abnormal sperm morphology and inversely correlated with the recovery of mature sperm. Results showed increased DNA damage in comparison to donors and patients with normal semen parameters (Figure 5) (Alvarez et al. 2002).
Figure 5. In the raw semen, the mean %DFI values, which indicate the extent of chromatin structure abnormality, were comparable to donors (25.9% + 10.2%) and patients with normal semen parameters (24.9% + 9.6%) but were significantly different from patients with abnormal semen samples (34.5% + 9.5%; p<0.01) and patients with leukocytospermia (39% + 10.9%; p<0.01) (Alvarez et al. 2002).