Genetic epidemiology of male infertility (MI) in Arabs: a systematic review

Abstract

Although Male Infertility (MI) in Arabs is fairly common, there is a dearth in published reports of genetic epidemiology of MI among Arabs. This study aimed to review the existing literature reporting the variants that are associated with MI in the 22 Arab countries. We searched four literature databases (PubMed, Science Direct, Scopus, and Web of Science) from the time of inception until April 2021 using broad search terms to capture all reported genetic data related to Arab patients with MI. Our search strategy identified 3488 articles, of these 34 were eligible for this systemic review. We retrieved data from nine Arab Countries (Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Syria, Jordan, Yemen, Iraq, Egypt and Lebanon). Only 2597 patients and 10 families with MI were identified and compared to 3721 controls. Our search strategy identified 25 genes, including 89 variants: 52.7% are shared with other ethnic groups, 41.7% are unique to Arab patients, and 5.6% are common among Arabs. Azoospermia (41.18%) was the most frequently reported phenotype. This is the first systematic review to capture reported variants associated with MI among the Arab populations. Although Arabs seem to share genetic profiles with other ethnicities, they have distinctive genotype-phenotype correlations for some of genetic variants.

Male infertility with muscle weakness: a point of view

“…To our knowledge, this is the first case of MI associated with MD1 in Syria. Although MI in Arabs is fairly common, there is a dearth in published reports of genetic epidemiology of MI, no data on the prevalence of MD1 in Syria 13 . The limitations in our case were the genetic studies, as many of them are not available in Syria, in addition to the higher costs.…”