Evaluating the effect of BESTFertil antioxidant complex on semen parameters and severity of asthenic syndrome in men with a recent history of novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19)

Abstract

Introduction. Direct influence of novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19) on male fertility is still unproven. However, through prolonged fever, hypoxia, systemic inflammation and other yet incompletely described factors this disease may apparently cause not only “long COVID” syndrome, but also transitory non-specific impairment of spermatogenesis. The study objective is to evaluate the effectiveness of administration of Russian complex with unique composition BESTFertil in case of decreased fertility and asthenic syndrome in males after new coronavirus infection.Materials and methods. We performed a non-blinded randomized prospective controlled trial which included 60 male patients with a history of COVID-19 not earlier than 6 months prior to enrollment from couples planning to have children. Patients were included if they had pre-disease semen analysis results available. They were divided into two equal groups. Group 1 (main group) received BESTFertil complex for 12 weeks, while Group 2 (comparison group) received no additional treatment. At baseline and 12-week follow-up all patients underwent semen analysis, MAR test, sperm DNA fragmentation test, serum sex hormone profiling and completed the “Asthenic condition scale” questionnaire. Student's t-test, Wilcoxon test, Mann-Whitney U-test and McNemar test were used for statistical analysis.Results. When comparing retrospective and baseline values we found no critical influence of COVID-19 on semen parameters, though a moderate decrease of percentage of sperm with progressive motility could be observed (40.5 % vs 30 %, p = 0.008). Group 1 had a stronger tendency toward recovery of semen parameters. Patients receiving BESTFertil had median total motile sperm count increased from 48.5 million to 76.8 million (p = 0.032), while in comparison group it increased from 39.8 million to 49.2 million (p = 0.317). BESTFertil antioxidant complex had no negative influence on endocrine profile. Moreover, there was a statistically significant decrease of sperm DNA fragmentation index from 21.2 to 13.9 % (p = 0.007) in Group 1. Lower rate of asthenic symptoms was observed in Group 1 which received BESTFertil.Conclusion. Men with a recent history of COVID-19 had a moderate decrease of surrogate fertility markers, most probably due to non-specific mechanisms. Patients receiving BESTFertil had a more pronounced recovery of semen parameters and improvement in post-COVID asthenic syndrome.