Can finasteride cause infertility?
Summary
TLDRThe video discusses finasteride as the gold standard for treating hair loss, addressing misconceptions about its side effects and fertility impact. It refutes the claim that finasteride causes irreversible infertility or birth defects, citing studies that show temporary fertility effects that normalize after discontinuation. The script also highlights the importance of finasteride in maintaining hair and dispelling myths spread by those who wish to see others fail.
Takeaways
- 💊 Finasteride is considered the best treatment for androgenic alopecia, effective both in the short and long term.
- 🌟 Many people have successfully used finasteride for over 20 years, maintaining its benefits.
- 🤔 Despite the effectiveness of finasteride, some individuals spread misinformation about its side effects out of jealousy or personal reasons.
- 🚫 Finasteride is not a birth control, and its presence in semen is minimal, posing no risk to fertility or causing birth defects.
- 🔍 A 2011 case report suggested a possible link between finasteride and sperm DNA fragmentation, but this was based on a single case and not substantiated by further research.
- 🧬 The sperm DNA fragmentation index (DFI) can indicate fertility issues, and in the case mentioned, it improved after stopping finasteride, but this was an isolated incident.
- 🧪 A 2007 study showed that finasteride had a mild negative impact on sperm formation in some men, but overall did not significantly affect fertility.
- 📈 The study found that sperm count initially decreased in finasteride users but returned to normal levels after 52 weeks, indicating reversible effects.
- 💪 Testosterone levels slightly increased in finasteride users, potentially due to the inhibition of DHT production, but this had no significant ergogenic effects.
- 🌱 Recovery of fertility after stopping finasteride is generally quick, with most effects reversing within three to six months.
Q & A
What is finasteride and why is it significant in treating hair loss?
-Finasteride is a pharmaceutical drug used primarily for treating androgenic alopecia, commonly known as male pattern baldness. It is significant because it is clinically proven to be effective in both the short and long term, with benefits maintained even after 10 years of continued use.
What is the role of minoxidil in hair loss treatment?
-Minoxidil is another medication used to treat hair loss, often used alongside finasteride. It is applied topically and helps stimulate hair growth. The combination of finasteride and minoxidil is considered the gold standard for treating hair loss.
How does the internet affect the perception of hair loss treatments like finasteride?
-The internet has provided a wealth of information about hair loss treatments, but it has also given a platform to individuals who may spread misinformation or negative experiences to deter others from using effective treatments like finasteride.
What is the psychological impact of hair loss on individuals?
-Hair loss can be mentally and cosmetically debilitating, affecting self-esteem and confidence. Some individuals who have experienced hair loss may try to see others fail as a way to cope with their own situation.
What are some of the false claims made against finasteride by its critics?
-Critics have falsely claimed that finasteride causes irreversible infertility and birth defects. These claims are not supported by evidence-based research and are often based on anecdotal reports or isolated cases.
What is the significance of the sperm DNA fragmentation index (DFI) mentioned in the script?
-The DFI is a measure of DNA damage in sperm, which can be a cause of infertility. A DFI of 30 is considered abnormal, and the script discusses a case where a man's DFI improved after stopping finasteride, suggesting a possible link.
What does the 2007 study involving 99 men tell us about the effects of finasteride on fertility?
-The study showed that finasteride and dutasteride had a mild negative impact on sperm formation, but the effects were not clinically significant for most men. It also showed that any decreases in sperm count were temporary and reversible after stopping the medication.
How does the dosage of finasteride affect its impact on fertility according to the script?
-The script suggests that the effects on fertility observed in studies may be dosage-dependent. Lower doses, such as the 1 mg daily used for treating androgenic alopecia, may have less impact on fertility than higher doses.
What is the conclusion of the script regarding the use of finasteride and its impact on fertility?
-The script concludes that while finasteride may have a small effect on fertility in a small percentage of men, it does not cause fertility issues in the majority. Any temporary fertility issues can be resolved by adjusting the dosage or stopping treatment temporarily.
Is there a risk of finasteride in semen causing birth defects in women?
-No, the amount of finasteride found in semen is minimal and studies have shown it to be unlikely to pose a risk to the developing fetus. There have been no credible reports of birth defects related to finasteride in semen.
Outlines
💊 Finasteride: The Gold Standard for Hair Loss Treatment
This paragraph discusses the effectiveness of finasteride in treating androgenic alopecia, commonly known as male pattern baldness. It highlights that finasteride is not only proven to be effective in the short term but also maintains its benefits over long-term use, even after a decade. The speaker emphasizes the drug's success in preventing hair loss and the availability of minoxidil as an alternative for those who do not respond well to finasteride. The paragraph also addresses the negative impact of social media, where some individuals spread misinformation about finasteride, claiming it causes irreversible infertility and birth defects. The speaker refutes these claims by citing a 2011 case report involving a man whose sperm DNA fragmentation index (DFI) improved after discontinuing finasteride, but also notes the lack of subsequent research to support these concerns.
🧬 Finasteride and Fertility: Debunking Myths with Research
The second paragraph delves into the impact of finasteride on male fertility, countering the myth that it causes irreversible infertility. It references a 2007 study involving 99 men, comparing the effects of dutasteride, finasteride, and a placebo on various fertility parameters such as sperm count, volume, morphology, and motility. The study found that while finasteride and dutasteride initially reduced sperm count, these levels returned to normal within 52 weeks. The paragraph also discusses the temporary decrease in sperm concentration and motility observed in the finasteride group, which resolved over time. The speaker concludes that finasteride does not significantly affect fertility in the majority of men and that any negative effects are reversible upon discontinuation of the drug.
🚫 Finasteride in Semen: No Risk to Fertility or Birth Defects
In the final paragraph, the speaker addresses concerns about the presence of finasteride in semen and its potential to cause birth defects. The speaker reassures that the amount of finasteride found in seminal fluid is minimal (less than 0.001 percent of the one milligram dose per ejaculation) and poses no risk to the developing fetus. This is supported by studies on rhesus monkeys and the absence of credible reports linking finasteride in semen to birth defects. The speaker encourages viewers to dismiss unfounded fears and emphasizes that using finasteride does not compromise one's ability to have children, encouraging a future generation to continue the fight against hair loss stigma.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Finasteride
💡Androgenic Alopecia
💡Minoxidil
💡Internet and Social Media
💡Fertility
💡Sperm DNA Fragmentation Index (DFI)
💡Randomized Control Trial
💡Dutasteride
💡Birth Defects
💡Dihydrotestosterone (DHT)
💡Semen Analysis
Highlights
Finasteride is considered the best treatment for androgenic alopecia, with long-term effectiveness proven even after 10 years of use.
People who have been on finasteride for over 20 years still maintain its benefits, debunking the myth of hair loss inevitability.
The combination of finasteride and minoxidil is the gold standard for treating hair loss, despite research into alternative treatments.
The internet provides a wealth of information but also platforms for those with harmful intentions regarding hair loss treatments.
Some individuals spread misinformation about finasteride's side effects, possibly due to personal insecurities or a desire to see others fail.
A case report from 2011 suggests a potential link between finasteride and sperm DNA fragmentation, but lacks broader evidence to support the claim.
The 2011 case report involved a 48-year-old man with a high sperm DNA fragmentation index, which improved after stopping finasteride.
A 2007 study with 99 men showed finasteride's temporary impact on sperm count, which returned to normal after treatment cessation.
Finasteride and dutasteride mildly affected sperm formation but did not cause clinically significant fertility issues in the majority of men.
A small percentage of men may be more sensitive to finasteride, experiencing more severe decreases in sperm count, but this is reversible.
The recovery of fertility after stopping finasteride is generally quick, with most effects reversing within six months.
The standard dose of finasteride for androgenic alopecia is less likely to affect fertility compared to higher doses used for other conditions.
Finasteride is not a form of birth control, as evidenced by healthy babies conceived by men using the drug.
The amount of finasteride found in semen is minimal and not considered a risk to developing fetuses.
Misconceptions about finasteride causing irreversible infertility and birth defects are largely unfounded and not supported by substantial research.
The video aims to dispel fears about finasteride's impact on fertility, encouraging informed decision-making about hair loss treatments.
Transcripts
what's up my homies and my tunes good to
be back with y'all
so we talked about hair loss on my
channel a lot and naturally that means
we've also discussed finasteride and
that is for good reason
finasteride is after all the best
treatment on the market for treating
androgenic alopecia
and crushing the slap head curse it is
the only treatment on the market that
has not only been clinically proven to
be effective in the short term
but also in the long term as it has been
proven effective even after
10 years of continued use and it is not
uncommon to find people who have been on
the drug for over 20 years
and still maintain all of the wonderful
benefits the drug has caused them
my friends we are extremely blessed to
be living in an era where solving hair
loss is as simple as just taking a pill
and forgetting about it
and for the few people where taking
finasteride is not enough there is also
minoxidil
and that is why despite all the research
into alternative pharmaceutical
treatments
the finasteride and minoxidil stack is
still the gold standard for treating
hair loss now as we all
know the internet has been revolutionary
in providing a
plethora of information to the public
about literally any subject
but it has sadly through social media
also given a platform to those who wish
to cause harm to others
for their own selfish reasons hair loss
is a mentally and cosmetically
debilitating condition
and many who have lost the good fight
against hair loss have taken it upon
themselves to see as many other people
fail as they possibly can simply due to
the fact that misery loves company
and it's easier to be a loser when
you're surrounded by other losers
because you know that helps you cope
these people cannot tolerate the fact
that the overwhelming majority of men
who use finasteride
have had great success with the drug
because every time someone
uses finasteride and reports success
with it it makes their own decision to
not use finasteride
come across as foolish the last thing a
bald coper wants to hear
is for someone to ask them why didn't
you just use finasteride when you still
had the chance
they hate that question because deep
down they know it is true
it really resonates with them painfully
knowing that the side effects are rare
that the horror stories people spread
online are not substantiated by any
evidence-based research
and they know and they hate the fact
that the majority of people who take
finasteride
will experience no adverse side effects
and the few that do experience adverse
side effects can easily mitigate them
through titration adjustments
so the next time you hear someone tell
you to just shave it bro
remember they're not saying that for
your sake they're saying it for their
own sake
so in their desperation to see other
people fail like they have
they've turned to a new tactic they are
now claiming that finasteride will cause
irreversible infertility
as well as birth defects now it is
medically known that women who are
pregnant or trying to conceive should
not use or handle finasteride since in
that case
it indeed can cause birth defects but
not being satisfied with just
that finasteride haters are now claiming
finasteride will cause birth defects
even if just men take it now you'd think
with such outlandish claims
they'd have some massive piece of
conclusive research like you know a
randomized control trial
with hundreds or thousands of subjects
but no all they have here is a case
report that was published in 2011.
this particular case report involves a
48 year old man
who had been trying to conceive with his
37 year old wife and had no success
after four years of trying
he'd been on finasteride at one
milligram per day for
many years they don't specify but we can
assume it's been a long time
so important note here is that the man
had no side effects from finasteride
including no erectile dysfunction they
did a semen analysis
a semen analysis and it showed he had
normal semen volume
normal sperm concentration as well as
normal sperm motility
they did check what's called the sperm
dna fragmentation index also known as
dfi and this was 30 which was high
so what does this dfi thing actually
mean well
dfi is a measurement of dna damage in
the sperm
and it can be a cause of infertility a
dfi of 30
is considered abnormal and because of
this the doctors advised that he stopped
finasteride in order to see if it would
stop the infertility problem
three months after stopping finasteride
the dfi went down to 21
and three months later and went down to
16.5
which is considered normal it's worth
mentioning that even after the dfi
dropped down
his wife still didn't get pregnant which
raises the possibility
that it was more of a problem with her
rather than with him
however the doctors who wrote the case
report felt that the abnormal dfi the
subject had before stopping finasteride
was actually due directly to the
finasteride so
this does seem pretty concrete at first
but one major problem with it is that we
don't have
any measurement of the dfi before he
started finasteride because keep in mind
he had already been on finasteride for
many years as they stated
but the worst case scenario is that even
if he did have an altered dfi for
finasteride it's clear that the dfi
rapidly returned to normal
within three months after stopping
treatment so based on this
one case report it does seem that this
48 year old gentleman may have had
fertility problems related to
finasterides but it is noteworthy that
this case report was published way back
in 2011
and since then we've had no subsequent
data to back up the reliability of this
research you know for all we know this
could have just been an outlier and the
dfi could have been due to some other
cause that we can't
identify at all i mean who knows maybe
he worked with x-rays or he was drinking
a lot of booze to cope with not being
able to knock up his wife i mean there's
many many
factors that could have caused it that
we don't know about so this is just
another example of why
a case study isn't usually considered
strong research also we know for a fact
that finasteride certainly isn't birth
control
i mean there have been many healthy
babies conceived by men who are on
finasteride so
even though there hasn't been another
study or case report on dfi
on finasteride there's more data on the
effect of finasteride
on male fertility in general fortunately
so in fact this very case report
actually references a study done in 2007
that involved 99 men who were randomized
to a dutasteride 0.5 milligram group
or a finasteride five milligram group
versus a placebo control group
so this is a much more uh thorough study
than the case report which just looked
at one bloke for whom all we know was
exposing his balls to radiation on a
daily basis
here we have an actual randomized double
blind and controlled study
with a fairly large sample size of
patients 99 in fact
so during this study semen samples were
taken and various measures were made
including sperm count
seminal volume sperm morphology as well
as sperm motility so basically they were
just trying to assess fertility in
general
also they measured serum testosterone
and dht levels in all subjects
as far as how they extracted the sperm
from the patients it's probably better
not to ask that
so we know the methodology here is good
because they're measuring fertility
across several
several parameters but what were the
results of the actual study
well as expected dutasteride and
finasteride lowered serum dht levels
with dutasteride serum dht levels were
lowered by 93
at 26 weeks and with finasteride the dht
was lowered
by 70 percent although keep in mind
we're talking about serum dh here
dht here we're not talking about scalp
dht now as far as serum testosterone
goes
uh they rose by about 25 and the
dutasteride and finasteride groups after
eight weeks of treatment but after that
they returned
close to baseline but they are still
slightly elevated and this is expected
because you're preserving the good
hormone testosterone by preventing the
five
ar enzyme from turning it into the trash
hormone dihydrotestosterone dht
and effectively wasting it this slight
increase in testosterone won't have any
ergogenic benefit from a sports
performance standpoint
but it might be why some people report
things like slightly elevated libido
while they're on five ar inhibitors
so looking at the semen parameters of
this study's outcome
after 24 weeks the total sperm count was
reduced by about 34
34 in the finasteride group and 29
percent in the dutasteride group
so that sounds bad right well stay with
me here because after 52 weeks the sperm
count had risen yet again
to the point where the difference
between baseline levels was no longer
statistically significant
and additionally there was further
improvement in sperm count after
stopping the drug for 20 to 24 weeks
another measured parameter was semen
volume which was reduced in both the
dutasteride
and the finasteride group after 26 weeks
and remained reduced in the due castrate
group after 52 weeks
although if you look at these graphs
here uh the difference really
doesn't seem to be that uh it's
clinically significant it looks pretty
mild to me
and you know it's not like any of these
drugs could be considered effective
birth control or anything of the sort
but um anyways that's just semen uh
volume we're looking at here so let's
look at actual sperm concentration
the sperm average uh concentration
remained relatively constant in all the
treatment groups throughout the study
except in the finasteride group at 26
weeks where it decreased significantly
at 22 percent
however the good news about that is that
by 52 weeks the sperm concentrations of
the finasteride group had gone back to
normal
and this result really correlates with
the rest of finasteride's supposed side
effects
because it has been shown that even when
people do get side effects from
finasteride they usually will get better
over time with continued use and that
applies to fertility as well it seems
so for the last observed parameters the
researchers looked at sperm motility
which showed a
small decrease in both the dutasteride
and finasteride groups of about 10
percent
sperm morphology was not changed with
either the finasteride or dutasteride
group though
so being that fertility is a
multifactorial equation that
is contingent on several parameters how
do we put this all into perspective
well the authors of the study concluded
that the two drugs had a
mild negative impact in sperm formation
in men
the average effect on the parameters
affecting fertility did not actually
fall below the thresholds for clinical
significance in the drugs
except for one point in time when the
total sperm count of finasteride was low
at 26 weeks but if you remember
that resolved by itself by 52 weeks so
the bottom line is that none of these
changes from finasteride or dutastride
are enough to cause fertility issues in
the vast majority of people
they did point out that approximately
five percent of the subjects on
treatment had more severe decreases in
sperm count
so it may be that there are some
individuals that are more sensitive to
these drugs than others
but even if you are one of those five
percent we know that stopping the drug
causes a relatively quick reversal of
the problem
six months at the very most also keep in
mind that this is based on
five milligrams of finasteride the
authors note that in a previous study
there was no effect
found on finasteride uh of finasteride
on sperm production whatsoever
however the dose in that study was one
milligram daily
which of course is the standard dose for
treating androgenic alopecia
so it is likely that the result of the
current study would be even more
optimistic if the dosage were equivalent
to what is used to treat androgenic
alopecia
instead of enlarged prostate the authors
also note that the recovery after
stopping treatment was quicker in the
finasteride group
which may be due to the shorter
half-life of finasteride compared to
tenastride
so since both drugs have a pretty market
effect on serum dht levels the authors
felt that this suggests that
quote testosterone alone may be
sufficient to maintain
qualitatively normal spermatogenesis in
most normal men
unquote so this is yet another reason in
the very long list of reasons
as to why dht is a trash hormone
you don't need it post puberty
testosterone is what makes you a man
dht just makes you an ugly old bald man
and if you're bald you're probably not
going to find a woman who will let you
put a baby in her to begin with so
pretty much the only outlet you'll have
for being a father
as a bald man is donating your semen to
clinical research
like in the trial we just reviewed so
what can we conclude from all this
can finasteride have a small effect on
fertility and a small percentage of men
who use it
yes but in the majority of men it
doesn't make any difference and even if
fertility is affected
it usually goes back to normal with
continued use and even in the
worst case scenario scenario where
fertility stays low while on treatment
you can either reduce your dosage and
failing that you can just temporarily
drop the treatment and just give it the
good old college try with your old lady
for a maximum of three to six months
and anything you lose in terms of hair
during that time you'll likely be able
to get back once you get on treatment
again so i wouldn't sweat it and also
you can temporarily switch to
topical anti-antigens like fluoridal or
alpha dial to kind of tide you over
while you're doing the nasty with your
lady
so that pretty much covers everything
regarding fertility
but one final question that people often
ask me that i want to address is whether
there is enough finasteride in the semen
to cause birth defects in women when
they get pregnant well
the answer to this is no but in case you
want more details
the uk drug database site on finasteride
states
quote a small amount of finasteride less
than 0.001 percent
of the one milligram dose per
ejaculation has been detected in the
seminal fluid of men taking propecia
studies and rhesus monkeys have
indicated that this amount is
unlikely to constitute a risk to the
developing male fetus unquote
in addition no credible reports of birth
effects have
have ever been found related to
finasteride in semen
so unsurprisingly this is just yet
another manufactured controversy
intended to frighten people out of using
finasteride but hopefully after this
video
you'll cast your fears aside and know
that saving your hair doesn't mean you
have to abandon your progeny
after all the world will need a new
generation of people to fight against
the slap head propaganda in the future
and with that i'm out homies see you
next time
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