Evaluation of the Sysmex UF-1000i system as an alternative for the screening of genital tract inflammation in male infertility patients.

The number of white blood cell (WBC) in semen is an important indicator of genital tract inflammation in male infertility. The peroxidase assay is the recommended reference method for seminal WBC counting. However, it is time-consuming and may cause relatively heavy workload in daily routine. Meanwhile, the main component in the reagent of peroxidase test is harmful to human and the environment. In this study, we evaluated the analytical performance of the Sysmex UF-1000i that is a urine flow cytometer as a screening tool for genital tract infection in male infertility patients through the counting of seminal WBC. We examined 143 semen samples and compared the results of UF-1000i and manual microscopy. The intra-assay variability, stability and linearity studies were performed. The intravariability (CV %) of seminal WBC count by Sysmex UF-1000i was 2.34%-9.65%. The method of UF-1000i displayed a good agreement with the reference assay of manual microscopy, and the r value for correlation of seminal WBC count between UF-1000i and manual microscopy was over 0.999 (p < 0.001). The Sysmex UF-1000i is capable of producing reliable seminal WBC count consistent with that obtained by manual microscopy. It is a suitable alternative to the manual microscopy, thus reduces the workload.