[beccarhill]

My husband was diagnosed with azoospermia about 7 years ago. All they did was a semen analysis. I believe they did check for a blockage in a routine urology exam.

Is there any possibility that we could get pregnant? Have there been any cases of someone being "cured" of azoospermia without medical treatment?

I guess I am hoping for a miracle!

[saracircus]

Beccarhill,

See the following article for information on this: http://www.cornellurology.com/infertility/srt/azoospermia.shtml.

Good luck.

[Mike Berkley, L.Ac.]

Hi:
Yes; pregnancy can be achieved quite often. Determining that a patient is azoospermatic via a semen analysis does not necessarilly mean that the man has no sperm. It may simply mean that sperm is not being ejaculated. You can do an IVF with TESE (Testicular Sperm Extraction) via needle biopsy. Your egg is retrieved and the sperm is directly injected into the egg via ICSI (intra cytoplasmic sperm injection). This method is often quite successful. If the sperm is not being ejaculated due to anatomical issues such as an absent vas deferens, TESE can still be used. One issue is that sperm which is not ejaculatable is often not of the best quality but testing it is inadvisable since there is a zero tolerance for wasting any of the sperm. Acupuncture and herbal medicine have been shown to be able to stimulate blood flow to the testes and improve quality such as reducing sperm DNA fragmentation levels. As it takes 72-90 days for 'new' sperm to be generated, perhaps a 3 month course of acupuncture and herbal medicine should be embarked upon before the TESE/IVF.

All the best!

Mike Berkley, L.Ac.