Complementary Medicine & Infertility

Diagnostic Window - East Meets West

One Traditional Chinese Medicine diagnosis which exists and which may be etiologic for male or female infertility is called Liver qi stagnation. One of the key identifiers of an individual with the pattern differentiation of Liver qi stagnation is anger, rage, frustration, depression and anxiety.

"Symptoms of depression, anxiety, and anger may help in determining the nature of infertility experienced by some couples, and identify those who would benefit most from psychological counseling, suggest researchers.

Dr. Secondo Fassino (University School of Medicine, Turin, Italy) and colleagues recorded the personal characteristics of 156 infertile and 80 fertile couples, and measured their degree of psychopathology. When the researchers divided the couples according to the nature of the infertility-organic, functional, or undetermined-they found that the triad of anxiety, depression, and a tendency toward anger suppression successfully predicted the diagnosis of organic or functional infertility in women, with 97 percent accuracy.

For infertile men, anxiety was also an important independent predictor of functional infertility, increasing the likelihood of having this form of infertility five-fold, while depression was more predictive of organic infertility. However, with men - unlike women - anger did not appear to influence infertility in men.

Herbal Medicine

The efficacy of herbal medicine in treating infertility is indisputable to the patient community although the mechanism of action is not completely understood at this time. Similarly the mechanism of action of tricyclic antidepressants is not fully understood in its effect on chronic pain (i.e., in the case of fibromyalgia), but its efficacy has been maintained.

I have used herbal formulae repeatedly to lower elevated FSH levels, to regulate irregular menstrual cycles, to mitigate pain in the endometriosis patient; to mitigate pain in the patient who presents with ovulation and/or menstruation related migraines; to thicken an unresponsive endometrium; to treat the amenorrheic; the oligomenorrheic patient; to treat patients with partial tubal occlusion; and the patient who presents with idiopathic infertility. Additionally, I have successfully treated male factor infertility, which includes presentations such as low sperm count and poor motility.

Complementary medicine and Western methods used together provide greater pregnancy rates.