[Quality of cryopreserved ejaculate in Hodgkin disease]

Each year approximately 70 males are diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease (HD) in Denmark. Most of these are less than 50 years of age. Since chemotherapy and radiotherapy may induce infertility in about 80% of patients, it has become routine to offer cryopreservation of semen prior to initiation of treatment. In 41 men aged 17-42 years at diagnosis we evaluated the quality of semen (according to the WHO criteria) prior to cryopreservation and after thawing. The median sperm concentration at the time of diagnosis was 33 x 10(6)/ml (range: 0.3-458 x 10(6)/ml) and positively correlated to age (rs = 0.36 p = 0.02) and to the histopathological classification (highest for patients with nodular sclerosis (p = 0.04) but not to semen volume, stage or presence of B-symptoms. The percentage of motile spermatozoa (range: 0-90%, median value 72%) was correlated to the sperm concentration; but not to any of the other parameters studied. Prior to freezing, 19 of 41 patients had normal semen quality according to the WHO criteria, whereas following thawing this was the case for only 14 semen samples. Ten of 23 patients with nodular sclerosis HD had normal semen quality (according to the WHO criteria) after thawing whereas this was the case for only 2 of 15 patients with mixed cellularity HD (p = 0.05). Cryopreservation of semen may secure the possibility of fathering children for patients with HD following therapy, and is to be recommended.