Szatmári Angelika, Helembai Kornélia, Zádori János, Kovács Ildikó
Department of Health Sciences, Faculty of Health Sciences and Social Studies, University of Szeged, Hungary.
Center for Assisted Reproduction, Albert Szent-Györgyi Clinical Center, Faculty of Medicine, University of Szeged, Hungary.
Heliyon. 2022 Jun 29;8(7):e09827. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2022.e09827. eCollection 2022 Jul.
The importance of contributing psychological factors and stress-control in female infertility is well documented, but research on their role in male infertility is scarce. The present study aimed to evaluate the effects of a novel paramedical counselling on anxio-depressive symptom severity, perceived stress and self-esteem in infertile men participating in an infertility treatment programme.
Patients were recruited from clinics of University of Szeged, Hungary between 2019 May and 2020 December, and were sorted into control (n = 51) and experimental (n = 57) groups, where patients in the experimental group received a 5-session paramedical counselling in extension to their medical treatment. The levels of anxio-depressive symptom severity, perceived stress and self-esteem were measured prior to and after receiving paramedical counselling. The control group scored lower in regards of the severity of depressive symptom, and showed an increase of self-esteem, while the experimental group resulted in a significant decrease of anxio-depressive scores with the elevation of the level of self-esteem.
Our results indicate that joining an infertility treatment programme alone had a positive role in reducing depressive symptoms and in the increase of self-esteem among infertile men, but receiving additional paramedical counselling throughout the treatment programme resulted in the decrease of anxio-depressive symptoms, besides the elevation of the level of self-esteem, with a significantly higher decrease in the state anxiety compared to not receiving this additional paramedical counselling.
Thus, it would be advisable for infertility treatment programmes to incorporate screening for psychological vulnerability and implement additional paramedical counselling to alleviate these confounding symptoms detrimental to conceiving.
心理因素和压力控制对女性不孕症的影响已有充分记录，但关于它们在男性不孕症中作用的研究却很少。本研究旨在评估一种新型辅助医疗咨询对参与不孕症治疗计划的不育男性焦虑抑郁症状严重程度、感知压力和自尊的影响。
2019年5月至2020年12月期间，从匈牙利塞格德大学诊所招募患者，分为对照组（n = 51）和实验组（n = 57），实验组患者在接受药物治疗的基础上还接受了5次辅助医疗咨询。在接受辅助医疗咨询前后测量焦虑抑郁症状严重程度、感知压力和自尊水平。对照组在抑郁症状严重程度方面得分较低，自尊有所提高，而实验组焦虑抑郁得分显著降低，自尊水平提高。
我们的结果表明，仅参加不孕症治疗计划对减轻不育男性的抑郁症状和提高自尊有积极作用，但在整个治疗计划中接受额外的辅助医疗咨询除了提高自尊水平外，还导致焦虑抑郁症状的减轻，与未接受这种额外的辅助医疗咨询相比，状态焦虑的降低更为显著。
因此，不孕症治疗计划最好纳入心理易损性筛查，并实施额外的辅助医疗咨询，以减轻这些对受孕有害的混杂症状。
