Varicocele

Overview

Journal BMJ Clin Evid

Specialty General Medicine

Date 2015 Jul 15

PMID 26168774

Citations 2

Authors

Rebecca MacLeod

Chandra Shekhar Biyani

Jon Cartledge

Ian Eardley

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Introduction: Varicocele is estimated to affect about 15% of the general male population. It usually occurs only on the left side, and is often asymptomatic. There is little evidence that varicocele reduces male fertility, although it is found in 12% of male partners of couples presenting with infertility and in 25% of men with abnormal semen analysis.

Methods And Outcomes: We conducted a systematic overview, aiming to answer the following clinical question: What are the effects of treatments in adult males with varicocele? We searched: Medline, Embase, The Cochrane Library, and other important databases up to November 2013 (Clinical Evidence overviews are updated periodically; please check our website for the most up-to-date version of this overview).

Results: Searching of electronic databases retrieved 203 studies. After deduplication and removal of conference abstracts, 91 records were screened for inclusion in the overview. Appraisal of titles and abstracts led to the exclusion of 53 studies and the further review of 38 full publications. Of the 38 full articles evaluated, one existing systematic review was updated and two systematic reviews and five RCTs were added at this update. We performed a GRADE evaluation of nine PICO combinations.

Conclusions: In this systematic overview we categorised the efficacy for four interventions, based on information relating to the effectiveness of embolisation, expectant management, sclerotherapy, and surgical ligation.

Citing Articles

Male infertility due to testicular disorders.

Sharma A, Minhas S, Dhillo W, Jayasena C J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2020; 106(2):e442-e459.

PMID: 33295608 PMC: 7823320. DOI: 10.1210/clinem/dgaa781.

Ultrasound evaluation of varicoceles: systematic literature review and rationale of the ESUR-SPIWG Guidelines and Recommendations.

Bertolotto M, Freeman S, Richenberg J, Belfield J, Dogra V, Huang D J Ultrasound. 2020; 23(4):487-507.

PMID: 32720266 PMC: 7588576. DOI: 10.1007/s40477-020-00509-z.

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