I have just returned from the British Association of Urologists Meeting in Birmingham. A chance to meet old friends and to meet aspiring and talented new Urologists.Some of the old friends included Michael Close and the Testim Team who have done so much for “Male Fertility”.
This year they hosted a very successful dinner for young urologists, so by definition I was lucky to be there !
Medical Conferences used to be all about “Look what I have done “ and usually “ Look what we have done better than our rivals next door “. But this conference was very different, there was much more about why we do it, how we involve others to help us succeed, and perhaps surprisingly how we can support and nurture the people who are doing often a seemingly impossible task in often adverse circumstances.
Despite this definite change in the mood music, the profession is focussed on the care of emergencies and cancer, and of course how to achieve “ more” with “less”
The consequences of this rather more holistic approach are not altogether favourable for Fertility and Andrology, partially because “Fertility “ is still regarded as the domain of gynaecologists but also because the male with infertility is seldom an emergency, and infrequently has cancer.
Nonetheless I was pleased to meet several young urologists keen to develop a practise in Andrology.
There were a few presentations of importance to Male Fertility. The most important was about improved live birth rates when sperm of better DNA quality were “ chosen “ for fertility treatments. It has been notoriously difficult to prove the importance of advanced tests of sperm quality ( DNA fragmentation ) to treatment outcomes, but this presentation certainly adds to our knowledge.

BAUS ZYMOT