Infertility: early warning signs of diabetes

Christiane Fux studied journalism and psychology in Hamburg. The experienced medical editor has been writing magazine articles, news and factual texts on all conceivable health topics since 2001. In addition to her work for, Christiane Fux is also active in prose. Her first crime novel was published in 2012, and she also writes, designs and publishes her own crime plays.

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Infertility is also a common problem in men. Around seven percent remain childless despite regular unprotected sexual intercourse. Such infertility can also indicate health problems. For example, a significant proportion of the men affected have already developed what is known as prediabetes. Most of them don't know about it.

Prediabetes is a precursor to diabetes. It is already associated with increased blood sugar levels. Above all, however, the body's cells are less sensitive to insulin: They no longer respond so well to the hormone that has the task of smuggling sugar from the blood into the body's cells.

15 percent with prediabetes

Researchers led by Luca Boeri from the Ospedale San Raffaele in Milan have examined the sugar metabolism of 744 sterile men. They found prediabetes in at least 15 percent of them.

Such a preliminary stage often falls through the diagnostic grid. He is symptom-free, and the blood sugar levels can be completely normal in spot checks. Testing the response of the body's cells to insulin - the clearest sign of prediabetes - is again time-consuming and is not done in routine examinations. Only the diabetes with the even more elevated blood sugar levels is diagnosed sooner or later.

Diabetes can be averted

This is unfavorable for those affected. With prediabetes, diabetes can often be averted by changing lifestyle: more exercise and a plant-based Mediterranean diet can normalize blood sugar and insulin resistance again.

The scientists recommend that doctors should therefore also consider possible prediabetes in men who are unwillingly childless. Affected men can ask their doctor for an appropriate check. Later diabetes can often be prevented - and potency also benefits from a healthier lifestyle. Smoking, obesity, an unhealthy diet and lack of exercise can damage the quality of sperm - and be the actual cause of fertility problems.

Once the diabetes has developed, it is often even more difficult to become a father: high blood sugar levels damage the nerves and blood vessels that are necessary to get an erection. That is why impotence (erectile dysfunction) is not uncommon among male diabetics.

Infertility in Germany

If it doesn't work out to have children, it is just as often the man as the woman: in 35 percent of unintentionally childless couples, the cause lies with him, in 35 percent with the woman alone and in 15 percent with both partners. For the remaining couples, the causes are unclear.

More and more couples are affected in Germany - mainly because having children is more often postponed to a later age. One in ten couples fails to become pregnant even though the partners have had unprotected sex on a regular basis for at least 12 months.

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