Male factors contribute to about half of all infertility cases. Despite this, infertility is still often considered a women’s health issue.
That’s why Colton Underwood, a television personality and former football player, joined a panel at the HLTH conference in Las Vegas to discuss his own experience with male infertility. He emphasized the importance of reducing the stigma around male infertility and getting men more involved in the family building process.
“I found myself surprised when I started my fertility journey with my husband, and we went into our fertility clinic, and after collecting our samples, … my doctor [said to me], ‘Well, you have four that are dead, but I could make them work.’ … It was sort of a shock to me, because I viewed myself as this healthy male, and I just never thought that I wouldn’t have sperm that worked, and it just caught me off guard. After having conversations with my family and some of my friends, I found out how common this actually is,” he said.
There were several factors that contributed to Underwood’s fertility challenges that he was not aware of until starting the family building journey, such as frequent hot tub use, saunas, steam rooms, wearing tight spandex while working out and taking testosterone replacement therapy.
After changing these habits and taking medication, his sperm health improved. He and his husband now have a one-year-old son.
Underwood isn’t alone in experiencing challenges with male infertility. This is something both Josh Halpern, chief scientific officer of Posterity Health, and Asima Ahmad, co-founder and chief medical officer of Carrot Fertility, have encountered frequently in their work at family-building companies. Halpern noted that a lot of men struggle when they find out this information.
“There’s a lot of shame and stigma. There’s a lot of guys who feel a responsibility, and we don’t like to think about fertility as a blame game, but a lot of guys, whether you’re competitive or you have a different kind of phenotype, really take it very hard,” he said on the panel. “I think part of our job as fertility specialists … is really to draw men in to help them understand [that] this is really common.”
The panelists also emphasized the importance of routine fertility testing for men, and increasing at-home testing options to make it more accessible. In addition, there should be emotional and peer support for those struggling with infertility, as well as education on things that affect fertility like testosterone replacement therapy.
Ultimately, this should be looked at as something that affects men just as much as it affects women.
“I think it’s important to emphasize that infertility is not just a woman’s issue,” said Asima Ahmad, co-founder and chief medical officer of Carrot. “We’re here to make it very clear that it affects men as well. And for men, infertility is not just a sperm issue either. It’s a part of your overall health. It’s a whole body, whole person thing. Your nutrition is a part of your fertility care. Your movement and exercise is a part of your fertility care. The way that you sleep, like the quality of sleep and your stress management is also part of fertility care.”
Photo: HLTH Inc.
