What is Infertility?

Infertility is a disease of the reproductive system that impairs one of the body's most basic functions: the conception of children. Conception is a complicated process that depends upon many factors:

• on the production of healthy sperm by the man and healthy eggs by the woman; unblocked fallopian tubes that allow the sperm to reach the egg; the sperm's ability to fertilize the egg when they meet;
• the ability of the fertilized egg (embryo) to become implanted in the woman's uterus; and sufficient embryo quality.

Finally, for the pregnancy to continue to full term, the embryo must be healthy and the woman's hormonal environment adequate for its development. When just one of these factors is impaired, infertility can result.

Male Infertility

Male infertility can possibly be linked to human papilloma virus as it causes serious conditions such as ASCUS in women. Failure to produce enough sperm is the leading cause of being infertile. Low sperm count or complete absence of living sperm could contribute to the condition. Large numbers of abnormally or unusually shaped sperm could reduce the mans fertility. Sperm quality and concentration of sperm is analyzed. Male infertility can possibly be linked to human papilloma virus as it causes serious conditions such as ASCUS in women..

Female Infertility

Female infertility can often be traced back through a pap smear test to HPV. There is increased chance of miscarriage and chromosomal abnormalities in a baby as women become older. The chance of becoming pregnant in the general population after the age of 40 is estimated to be only 5% cycle compared to about 20% per cycle under the age of 40. Female infertility can often be traced back through a pap smear test to HPV.F

Combined infertility

In some cases, both the man and woman may be infertile or sub-fertile, and the couple's infertility arises from the combination of these conditions. In other cases, the cause is suspected to be immunological or genetic; it may be that each partner is independently fertile but the couple cannot conceive together without assistance.

Unexplained infertility

In about 15% of cases the infertility investigation will show no abnormalities. In these cases abnormalities are likely to be present but not detected by current methods. Possible problems could be that the egg is not released at the optimum time for fertilization, that it may not enter the fallopian tube, sperm may not be able to reach the egg, fertilization may fail to occur, transport of the zygote may be disturbed, or implantation fails. It is increasingly recognized that egg quality is of critical importance and women of advanced maternal age have eggs of reduced capacity for normal and successful fertilization.

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