Preparing for the Urologist

Plainjanie

Just wondering if anyone wanted to share their experiences with meeting with the Urologist with your DH and if you had any questions that we should be asking!

We are going to see him for low count and low morphology.

Thank you!

GoldenKeys

My DH's first count came in on the lower end of normal  but with really low volume and he was sent to the urologist to find out why.   Frankly I wasn't impressed with our urologist, who didn't seem to care too much about our TTC problems.  

He took DH's medical history, ordered some blood and urine tests, and a second SA.  He also did a digital rectal exam to feel his prostate.   I got the feeling that he thought we were just being hypochondriacs even though by that time we had being seriously trying every month for 1.5 years with no baby.

I had planned to schedule an appointment with another urologist but our second SA came out fine and we stopped that line of testing.

wifeinraleigh28

We met with the urologist for the first time last week.  We were referred to one by our RE who specialized in male infertility so he immediately jumped into "you should be pregnant by now, let's make it happen" mode.  He actually wanted to be very aggressive with our treatment plan, which I do appreciate but we had to slow things down a little for our own sanity.  I think it's really important to make sure the urologist is aware of everything that you've tried so far to conceive and every medication your DH has been on recently, and bring copies of your SAs.  Our biggest issue is that my DH has been taking androgel for low testosterone for the last 8 years.  The urologist was surprised that he wasn't sterile as a result.

We think the urologist was used to men coming in on androgel and abusing it because they like the effects of the added testosterone supplement, so we really had to make him understand that DH was prescribed it for a reason.  Even with the maximum dose of androgel he is still only in the middle of the normal therapeutic range for testosterone.  The urologist wanted DH to stop androgel immediately and start taking clomid, which he says has a 95% chance of increasing natural testosterone (which we obviously need).  Chances of it increasing sperm count are lower, however the urologist thinks that simply getting DH off of androgel will help improve our sperm numbers.  We weren't comfortable with DH stopping androgel cold turkey, I mean he has been on it for 8 years and needs it to feel normal!  So we advocated for a tapering plan.  The urologist said to cut his dosage in half and only take it every other day while taking 50 mg clomid every day.  We get a new SA and bloodwork to test T levels on 1/28.

So far we have followed this treatment plan now for going on 5 days and DH has been feeling really good actually.  We were terrified that he would get really depressed (which often happens when you get a drop in T).  He was so worried about it that he called his family (he works for his family business) and warned them that he may not be able to come in to work the next few weeks!  So far things have been going well and I'm hoping it stays that way.

Hopefully your appointment goes well!  After we left the urologist last week I was nervous about our new treatment plan but also felt like we were finally meeting with the right specialist.  An RE isn't going to help improve MFI issues, they are just going to medicate the female and/or do IUIs or IVF.  Meeting with the urologist is a better first step!