Does seasonality alter intrauterine insemination outcomes: a 5-year study.

PurposeTo determine if seasonal changes alter pregnancy rate in intrauterine insemination (IUI) patients.MethodsOne-thousand and eighty semen analyses prepared for IUI were evaluated in this retrospective cohort study of 496 patients.ResultsVolume, pH, sperm concentration, and pregnancy rates were not altered by season. However, the percent motility, the total motile spermatozoa in the ejaculate, the straight-line velocity (VSL) of spermatozoa, as well as the morphology of sperm were altered by season. In a subset of these patients that were defined as normal, only the VSL and the morphology of the spermatozoa were altered by seasonal changes.ConclusionsSeasonality alters sperm motility parameters as well as morphology, but these changes are not significant enough to alter pregnancy rates.