Background/Purpose: As reproductive health is gathering attention in rheumatology and all medical fields, the male perspective on the matter is often overlooked as not directly related to pregnancy and lactation. The objective of this study was to describe male perception of sexuality, fertility, contraception, conceiving related to their rheumatic disease, and their need to explore these aspects in a dedicated counselling session.

Methods: In this cross-sectional observational study, a survey about reproductive health (sexuality, contraception, fertility, conceiving, pregnancy, lactation, transmissibility) in relation to their disease has been administered to consecutive patients with immune-mediated diseases aged 18 to 50years, attending a Reproductive Health Counselling Clinic.

Results: From January 2023 to February 2024, 110 male patients completed the survey (Table 1).

Regarding sexuality, 9.1% of patients noted a change after the diagnosis, 20% thought their rheumatic disease influences their sexuality and 3.6% believed their partner sexual behavior changed after the rheumatological diagnosis; 61.8% affirmed not to use condoms.

10% and 16.5% of patients reported their fertility may be influenced by their disease or the drugs taken for it, respectively. 37% of patients were worried both for the effect that their disease or the drugs taken for it could have on conceiving. From our data, 61% were worried about transmissibility of their disease to children.

Almost half (44.5%) of the patients had never addressed any reproductive health issue with any physician, while 41.8% had already discussed these topics with a rheumatologist, 2.7% with a urologist and 6.4% with their general practitioner.

Figure 1 shows which aspects of reproductive health had already been addressed during routine visit and which aspects patients needed to address. Topics that patients needed to address the most were transmissibility of their disease (56%), sexuality (28%) and fertility (28%). Only 35% of patients requested to receive more information in a dedicated counselling session.

Conclusion: Male patients worry that their disease and drugs may influence their sexuality and fertility and about the possibility to transmit the disease to their children. Nevertheless, 50% of them has never addressed these aspects during any routine visit.

ACR Meeting Abstracts - https://acrabstracts.org/abstract/male-perspective-on-reproductive-health-in-rheumatology-patients-a-cross-sectional-study/