Expressive Writing in Male Infertility

University Hospital Bonn (UKB)

Status: Completed

Conditions: Infertility, Male

Treatments: Behavioral: Expressive writing

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT00385346

Lfd.Nr.068/06

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of this study is to determine whether expressive writing can be effective in improving the well-being and sperm quality in patients with male infertility.

Full description

Expressive writing is a therapeutic intervention designed by the psychologist James W. Pennebaker. Individuals write on three days for about 20 minutes about particularly stressful experiences in their life. Several studies showed that expressive writing can have beneficial effects on the frequency of health care utilization and well-being. Particularly in patients with rheumatism, kidney cancer and posttraumatic stress disorder expressive writing showed an positive effect on subjective well-being. Furthermore, in several studies expressive writing showed a positive effect on immune parameters.

As many studies suggest an important negative effect of stress on well-being and sperm parameters in male infertility, we want to investigate the effect of expressive writing in male infertility.The expressive writing condition is compared to a non emotional writing condition, in which individuals write about mainly non emotional topics such as time management. In this randomized-controlled trial subjects were allocated sequentially by block wise randomization (block size of 4). For randomization a computer generated random list was used. The allocation was concealed in a series of numbered sealed envelopes. The envelope was opened immediately before the first writing session.

Enrollment: 56 patients

Sex: Male

Ages: 18 to 55 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Male infertile patients with a pathological spermiogram according to WHO criteria

Exclusion criteria

• Drugs affecting sperm quality
• Patients with chromosomal anomalies affecting sperm quality (e.g. Klinefelter- Syndrome)
• Severe Psychiatric disorder defined as psychotic disorder (schizophrenia, bipolar disorder) or substance-related disorder
• Patients currently in psychotherapeutic or psychiatric therapy

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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56 participants in 1 patient group

A 1

Experimental group

Description:

Expressive writing

Treatment:

Behavioral: Expressive writing