Addiction and human male fertility: A systematic review and a critical appraisal

• Published in: Andrology (Oxford) Vol. 10; no. 6; pp. 1073 - 1095
• Main Authors: Alghobary, Moheiddin, Mostafa, Taymour
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England Wiley Subscription Services, Inc 01.09.2022
• Subjects: Addiction; Addictions; Fertility; hormones; infertility; semen; substance use disorders; Systematic review; Addiction-Substance use disorders- Infertility-Fertility-Semen-Hormones
• ISSN: 2047-2919; 2047-2927
• DOI: 10.1111/andr.13196

Background Addiction is a global problem that has many negative consequences on human health as well as the quality of life. Objectives This review aimed to assess the effect of addiction on human male fertility. Methods A systematic review was conducted on various electronic sites. Results The initial literature search identified a total of 5239 articles in all searched databases. After removing duplicates and application of inclusion/exclusion criteria, 177 were potential articles, 112 were omitted because no direct relevance was encountered. Finally, 65 studies were retained for review. They were classified according to the type of addiction into; opioids and cannabinoids (18 articles), alcohol (7 articles), cocaine (2 articles), Androgenic Anabolic steroids (AAS, 15 articles), tobacco (10 articles) and caffeine (13 articles). Most of these recruited articles demonstrated a negative impact of the addressed substance on male fertility with variable levels of evidence. Conclusions It was concluded that addiction harms human male fertility that should be put into consideration. More future studies are needed after a proper methodological and statistical approach, including logistic regression analysis, to predict the effect of a specific substance on human male fertility.