Purpose: We determined whether repair of subclinical varicoceles detected by scrotal duplex ultrasonography results in significant seminal improvement and identified the best ultrasonographic criteria to use in the selection of patients for subclinical varicocelectomy.
Materials and methods: Of 256 consecutive infertile men being evaluated by physical examination and color duplex scrotal ultrasonography 76 underwent varicocele repair and were followed with serial semen analyses. All subclinical varicoceles were confirmed by venography. The outcome of varicocelectomy was determined by changes in total motile sperm count and compared among patients with different clinical grades of varicoceles and ultrasonographically measured in veins sizes.
Results: A significant overlap was observed between ultrasonographically measured venous diameter and clinical grade of varicocele. There was no correlation between venous diameter and postoperative outcome when controlled for clinical grade. Significant postoperative improvement in semen parameters was noted in 67% of patients with clinical and only 41% with subclinical varicocelectomy (p<0.05). The best ultrasonographic cutoff to predict a positive outcome after subclinical varicocelectomy was venous diameter greater than 3mm. Patients with larger clinical varicoceles had greater postoperative seminal improvement than those with small or subclinical varicoceles regardless of baseline sperm count.
Conclusion: Varicocele size has a direct impact on the probability and amount of seminal improvement after varicocelectomy. Outcome following subclinical varicocelectomy is significantly less than after repair of clinical varicoceles. Although 41% of patients with subclinical varicoceles had significant postoperative improvement in semen parameters, an equal number were worse postoperatively and, thus, mean sperm count was unchanged for the group. The results of our study suggest that subclinical varicocelectomy is of questionable benefit.