New Approaches to Assess Fertility in Domestic Animals: Relationship between Arterial Blood Flow to the Testicles and Seminal Quality

摘要

Reproduction is one of the most important economic factors at a production level. For that reason, the evaluation of the breeding soundness (BS) is of great relevance to secure high production rates. There is ongoing research to find new markers to bring closer breeding soundness examination (BSE) results to real fertility outcomes. Among the different methods to evaluate BS, ultrasonography is routinely used and it is the method of choice to evaluate the testicular parenchyma. Doppler mode allows the quantitative and qualitative evaluation of the irrigation of organs and can be used as an important diagnostic technique for evaluating the testicular irrigation. In humans and several animal species, a relationship between Doppler parameters of the testicular artery and seminal quality has been found. This suggests pulsed wave Doppler ultrasound measurements and indices could be proposed as objective parameters to evaluate testicular function.