Evaluation of the Concentration of Anti-Spermatozoa Antibodies in Seminal Plasma of Normozoosperms and Azoosperms of Patients at the Pasteur Institute of Cote d’Ivoire

Under normal circumstances, spermatozoa are protected from the immune system by the blood-testis barrier. The breakdown of this barrier is the origin of the synthesis of antisperm antibodies (ASA). The presence of sperm agglutinates in semen is characteristic of ASA. But is the presence of agglutinates in semen necessarily linked to the level of ASA in semen? The objective of this study was to assess the concentration of anti-sperm antibodies (ASA) in normozoosperms and infertile men with azoospermia. The biological material consisted of samples of human sperms: 30 samples with azoospermia and 32 with normozoospermia. The ASA assay was performed in seminal plasma using the DRG® Sperm Antibody ELISA (seminal plasma) kit (EIA-4249). The reading was carried out using a microplate reader at 450 nm. Data analysis was performed using Graph Pad Prism 7 software. The results obtained showed that the difference in ASA concentration between these two categories of sperm was not significant, with an average ASA level of 31.54 ± 2.45 U/mL in azoospermic ejaculate and 27.63 ± 1.51 U/mL in normozoosperms. Statistical analysis showed higher ASA concentrations in azoosperms with 6.67% of these declared positive. The ASA positivity rate made it possible to distinguish secretory azoospermias from obstructive ones. Also, the presence of ASA is not necessarily linked to the presence of agglutinates in the semen.