Efficacy of alpha-lipoic acid combined with tamoxifen citrate in the treatment of oligoasthenospermia / 中华男科学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective@#To investigate the effect of alpha-lipoic acid (α-LA) combined with tamoxifen citrate (TC) in the treatment of oligoasthenospermia.@*METHODS@#From June to November 2016, we treated 60 patients with oligoasthenospermia in our Department of Andrology, 30 (the trial group) with oral α-LA (0.6 g, qd) + TC (20 mg, qd) and the other 30 (the control group) with oral L-carnitine (1g, bid) + TC (20 mg, qd). Before and after 3 months of medication, we examined the semen parameters of the patients and the levels of their seminal oxidative stress biomarkers, including methylenedioxyamphetamine (MDA) and total antioxidant capacity (TAC) in the seminal plasma. We also compared the pregnancy rate and adverse reactions between the two groups.@*RESULTS@#Totally, 57 of the patients completed the treatment, 28 in the trial group and 29 in the control. Compared with the baseline, the patients of the trial group showed significant improvement after 3 months of medication in the semen volume (［2.50 ± 0.71］ vs ［3.37 ± 0.70］ ml, P 0.05) except in TAC, which was markedly more improved in the former than in the latter (P 0.05). After 3 months of treatment, 3 pregnancies were achieved in the trial group and 1 in the control (10.7% vs 3.45%, P >0.05). No obvious adverse events occurred during the treatment.@*CONCLUSIONS@#Alpha-lipoic acid combined with tamoxifen citrate can evidently improve semen parameters in oligoasthenospermia patients by relieving oxidative stress injury.