andro-test and Semen Self-Exam: their importance in prevention and in the diagnostic process
Abstract
The andro-test is the only semen analysis which describes the health condition of the male genital tract and the only one qualified for diagnostic purposes. The physiological values defined are used to evaluate the relative risk mainly of having a urogenital tract infection. This study assesses the importance of the andro-test and of the Semen Self-Exam in the preventive checkup of men and in the andrological diagnostic process. It is proven that in almost 9 out of 10 cases (87,68%), if at least one of the semen parameters is outside the physiological values, a microbe is detected in the semen sample in exam. Inversely, it is also proven that in 98,76% of the samples where a microbe was detected, at least one of the parameters of the andro-test was outside the physiological values.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Articles published in IJS are distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Publication policies
IJS subscribes, and will continue to subscribe, to the best ethical principles in the publication of scientific work. The policies published here are meant to provide general guidelines and are in tandem with the best practices adopted (and disseminated) by many prominent publishers, scientific journals, and scientific publication forums across the world. The policies outlined here are living policies and will thus be updated as necessary. Submission is a representation that the manuscript has not been published previously and is not currently under consideration for publication elsewhere (except in the form of an abstract or as part of a published lecture, review, final project, thesis or dissertation). The corresponding author is responsible for ensuring that the article’s publication has been approved by all the other coauthors. It is also the authors’ responsibility to ensure that the articles emanating from a particular institution are submitted with the approval of the necessary institution. Only an acknowledgment from the IJS editorial office officially establishes the date of receipt. Further correspondence and proofs will be sent to the corresponding author before publication unless otherwise indicated. It is a condition of submission of a paper that the authors permit editing of the paper for readability. All enquiries concerning manuscripts under consideration should be addressed to the Editor-in-Chief.
Peer Review
Every submission for a featured manuscript is evaluated by at least two members of the review panel. Reviewers help the Editor-in-Chief determine the paper’s relevance and significance, the degree to which it advances knowledge, the quality of scholarly presentation, the integrity of research methods, and content relevant to human Spermatology.
Copyright
All articles published by IJS are made freely accessible online immediately upon publication, without subscription charges or registration barriers. By doing this, authors’ works become accessible to the widest scientific and professional audience around the world especially in resource-limited parts of the world. In addition, authors of articles published in IJS are the copyright holders of their articles and have granted to IJS, the right to use, reproduce, or disseminate the article according to the journal’s copyright and license agreement.
Authors must obtain the written permission from the copyright owner (usually the author and publisher) for the use of tables, illustrations, or extensively quoted material which has previously appeared in another publication. The authors are responsible for any costs incurred relating to obtaining permissions for any such material.
Article processing charges
Author Fees Based on Location
- Developed (Tier 1) Countries: Eur 400
- Developing & Emerging (Tier 2) Countries = Eur 200
Ethical guidelines
To maintain high scientific quality, our editorial processes and practices follow guidelines/policies issued and updated by the following organizations:
Open Access: In addition to strict compliance with the above guidelines, our open-access publishing practices follow best practices, guidelines, and policies outlined in The Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing issued by COPE, Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA), and Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ).
This journal is to be indexed in DOAJ, and will be subjected to the required screening and rescreening for open-access publishing best practices as established and updated by DOAJ.
This journal will subscribe to and comply with best practices for open-access publishers as established and advocated by OASPA.
IJS subscribes to the highest ethical standards in the dissemination of scientific research work. IJS subscribes to the ethical standards established by most of the international organizations on ethics.
Authors should describe in detail all new experimental and non-experimental research methods and ethically relevant aspects of their work bearing in mind the following:
Human Experiments
All work must be conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. Papers describing experimental work on human subjects who carry a risk of harm must include the following statement:
“I/we declare that the experiment described in this manuscript was conducted with the understanding and the consent of the human subject.”
In addition, please add a statement that the responsible Ethical Committee or Institutional review Board has reviewed and approved the study/experiments.
Animal Experiments
Papers describing experiments on living animals should provide information on the following:
- A full description of any anaesthetic and surgical procedure used.
- Evidence that all possible steps were taken to avoid animal suffering at each stage of the experiment. Papers describing experiments on isolated tissues must indicate precisely how the donor tissues were obtained.
In all cases, IJS reserves the right to ask authors for more information about their treatment of human and animal subjects in their work prior to publication.
IRB Approval
IJS requires that all studies that involve human subjects or participants be approved or deemed exempt by an official institutional review board or ethics review board as applicable in the authors’ country. Information about ethical approvable must be clearly stated in the Methodology section of the manuscript before submission.
Informed Consent
IJS requires that authors obtain requisite informed consent and/or assent or other applicable consent from all human subjects or participants in their study. Authors are required to state whether and how informed consent/assent was obtained in their study in their manuscript.
In reporting their studies, authors should avoid the use of names, initials, and hospital numbers of patients/volunteers or study participants or subjects. In very rare circumstances where the authors are submitting photographs of study participants, these individuals should not be recognizable from photographs unless their written permission has first been obtained.
Please contact the editorial office ijs@spermatology.org before submitting any videos, photographs, or other images of study participants.
Editorial principles
IJS adheres to the finest editorial principles to ensure that the work it publishes are accurate, timely, fair and conform to the best ethical principles of publication of scientific papers as outlined here and may be updated from time to time. We believe that principles like those outlined here provide clear and clarity and rigorous guidelines for best working practices in scientific publishing and for ensuring the integrity of the papers that we publish. We believe that these principles and policies will benefit our authors, editors and readers as we strive for a trustworthy, transparent and efficient publishing process.
Confidentiality
Editors and reviewers are expected to treat articles they handle confidentially. Editors and reviewers must not disclose information about manuscripts (including their receipt, content, status in the publishing process, reviewer feedback and final decision) to anyone, other than the authors.
Objectivity and Fair Play
An Editor will evaluate manuscripts for their intellectual content without regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy of the authors. Reviews should be conducted objectively. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate. Referees should express their views clearly with supporting arguments.
Integrity of the Scientific Record
IJS is committed to maintaining the integrity of the published record and to publishing the most objective and unbiased scientific information possible. As such, we subscribe to the principles adopted by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), and follow the COPE’s Code of Conduct.
Research misconduct includes fabrication, falsification, or plagiarism in proposing, performing, or reviewing research, or in reporting research results, according to experts. If a suspicion or allegation of scientific misconduct or fraudulent research is brought to the journal’s attention concerning a manuscript submitted for review, IJS reserves the right to raise these concerns with other relevant institutions or other appropriate authorities for investigation. In the handling and resolution of such cases, we follow COPE’s guidance and recommendations
IJS will take all necessary steps to maintain the accuracy and quality of the papers it publishes. To this end, IJS will publish correspondence about papers and publish Errata and Corrigenda when appropriate. In cases of serious error or scientific misconduct, it may be necessary to ask authors to retract their papers or to impose retraction upon them. Should an author discern a significant error or inaccuracy in the published article, they are responsible for notifying IJS Editor-in-Chief or publisher, and should work together with them to retract or correct the paper. If the Editor-in-Chief or the publisher learns that a published article contains a significant error, the author will be asked to correct or possibly retract the paper, or assist verification by the Editor-in-Chief of the correctness of the original paper.
Errata and Corrigenda
Should an error appear in a published article that affects scientific meaning or author credibility but does not affect the overall results and conclusions of the paper, our policy is to publish a correction in print and online in the next available issue of the journal. If an error is introduced by the publisher during the editing and/or proofing stages, the journal takes responsibility and a correction is published as an Erratum, with appropriate apologies to authors and readers. If an error is introduced by the authors, the correction is published as a Corrigendum and the author is required to pay all costs associated with the correction.
Retractions
Should a paper contain one or more significant errors or inaccuracies that change some or all of the results or conclusions described therein, the entire paper may be retracted. The word ‘retraction’ will be used in the title of the retraction to ensure that it is picked up by indexing and archiving systems. The journal will request an explanation from the author(s) as to how the errors or inaccuracies occurred, and if they are not satisfied with the response they will ask the employers of the authors or some other appropriate body to investigate, and particularly to consider the possibility of fraudulent behaviour. The journal will make all reasonable attempts to ensure that such an investigation is carried out with due diligence. To the extent possible, we will assist the parties and their institutions in the resolutions of these cases.
Should an author discern a significant error or inaccuracy in the published article, they are responsible for notifying IJS, and should work together with the journal to retract or correct the paper. If the journal learns that a published article contains a significant error, the author will be asked to correct or possibly retract the paper, or assist verification by the Editor-in-Chief of the correctness of the original paper.
Redundant or Concurrent Publication
Research manuscripts that describe work already published elsewhere will not be considered. The submission of the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently is also considered to be unethical practice. This does not prevent journals from considering articles that have been rejected by other journals or that were not previously published in full (e.g. abstracts or posters presented at scientific meetings).
When submitting, authors should declare any previous submissions or reports that might be regarded as redundant or duplicate publication. Copies of any such related articles should be included with the submitted manuscript to assist editorial decision making. If redundant publication is attempted or occurs, editorial action will be taken, including probable rejection or publication of a notice of redundant or duplicate publication.
Anti-Plagiarism
Plagiarism is the “use of others’ published and unpublished ideas or words (or other intellectual property) without attribution or permission, and presenting them as new and original rather than derived from an existing source”, see www.wame.org – the World Association of Medical Editors web site). It is considered a dishonest and unacceptable practice. By submitting an article, authors are thereby asserting that their work is entirely original and that others’ work or text has been appropriately cited or attributed.
IJS is committed to the publication of high-quality, original, research in the field of human Spermatology. The journal editors and publisher will take every step to ensure that, to the best of their knowledge, papers published in the journal are original and conform to the best ethical principles. This includes the use of proprietary and open-source anti-plagiarism screening services and software to verify the originality of content submitted before publication. Manuscripts found to have been plagiarized will be automatically rejected and the editors reserve the right to notify appropriate agencies or the institutions of the corresponding authors.
Author Contributions
An author is someone who has made significant and substantial contributions to a study. This should include conception, design, execution and interpretation of the findings being published, and drafting and revising the article. Papers must be submitted with the agreement of all authors, and all authors should give final approval of the version to be published. Those who have made other contributions to the work, such as by providing reagents or assisting with the writing, should be listed in the Acknowledgements, and their role or involvement outlined.