Efficacy of L-Carnitine Therapy in Selected Cases of Male Factor Infertility

Abstract

The purpose of the Placebo-controlled double-blind trial study is to investigate how effective the L-Carnitine therapy on cases of selected male factor infertility in a private clinic for 3 years duration. For this study, two hundred infertile male patients ages 20 to 40 years were chosen with the following basic sperm selection criteria: concentration, lesserthan or equal to 20x106 per mL, total motility, 10percentage to-30 percentge, forward motility, 70 perventage, velocity, 10 to 30 micro per second, linearity, greater than 4. greater than 15%, a typical forms. Out of the selected sample, 172 patients completed the study. The patients were subject to L-Carnitine therapy of 1g per day or placebo. The study course was as the following. 2 months of removing the L Carnitine, 2 months of therapy per placebo, 2 months of L Carnitine, and 2 months placebo per therapy. Different parameters were used to choose the male patients. The researcher selected sperm motility in specific. As a result, there was a statistically significant improvement in semen quality, better than the placebo alone. The improvement was noticed after the L Carnitine therapy for sperm concentration and total and forward sperm motility. Those patients with lower values at the beginning of the study i.e. greater than 10X106 or greater than 5X106 of forwarding motile sperm per ejaculate or sperm per ml manifested a more noticeable increase in forwarding sperm motility. In conclusion, L Carnitine therapy proved to be effective in enhancing the semen quality, particularly among the patients with lower baseline levels. Yet, these results should be confirmed by larger clinical attempts in vitro studies.