Daily sex improves sperm quality: Study

According to the study, men seeking to become dads should have daily intercourse before their partner ovulates, to improve the genetic quality of their sperms.

Dr David Greening, MD of Sydney IVF in Wollongong, Australia said, "Sperm don't seem to like staying in warm testicles for too long. The advice might be to keep the rivers flowing."

Study shows sex helps improve men’s fertility
The Australian doctor studied 118 men with a history of infertility, recurrent miscarriage, or repeated In vitro fertilization (IVF) failure, whose sperm had a higher than normal level of DNA damage.

Before proceeding with the study, it was found that 34 percent of the group's sperms were rated as ‘damaged’ and were classified as "poor” in quality.

The men were then asked to ejaculate daily for seven days. They were not given any drugs and were asked not to make changes in their lifestyle.

After seven days, their sperms were examined again. This time, the average of the damaged sperms fell to 26 percent, placing it in the range of "fair" in quality.

Fourth-fifths of the men saw an increase in their sperm quality, and many of them moved into the "good" category; and out of the "poor" or "fair" categories.

Though sperms became more active over a week’s time, with a small rise in motility, yet one-fifth of the men saw a decline in their sperms quality.

The dangers involved
Though Dr Greening has shown us a brighter side, yet he warns that having daily sex for too long, say a fortnight would probably cut sperm numbers too much.

“We are designed to breed in our youth. As men age they may not have as much sex as they did when they were younger, which adds to the problem of infertility,” says Greening.

"Perhaps we have been blaming the women as couples get older but perhaps there's a contribution from the male because we're not behaving as we should be," he continued.

Future prospects of the study
Dr Alan Pacey, fertility expert at the University of Sheffield, was of the view that the finding of daily ejaculation improving the chances of conception was really interesting, but it would be wrong to apply the results to all men.

“The research did not investigate whether the improvement in sperm quality led to better pregnancy rates or not,” said Greening, “but more research is needed to see if the couples' pregnancy rates improved as a result of the men's daily ejaculation.”

The study was presented by Dr Greening himself, in Amsterdam, Netherlands, at the 25th annual meeting of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology.