Confused over seman analysis

My husband who is 31 had a seman analysis in March 2010 and there was a total of 40 million. Then he had another in Nov 2010 and the total was 10 million.  Last week we had IUI and we were told the total was 1.4 million!!!  Is it possible for the results to vary so much.  He hasn't been ill, doesn't smoke and has been cutting back on his alcohol since the first test.

We are both really confused and obviously my husband is gutted and now we just know the IUI won't be successful.

Any help or experiance on this will be much appreicated.

Thanks

[cutepoppy]

very surprising...from 40 million to 10million..and now 1.4million...well such differences do not occur unless ur dh was havin some major illness...a little difference in semen quantity does occur at times...n its normal but such drop in levels ?? how's the morphology and mobility??never mind bout ur iui...afterall it takes such ONE sperm to make u pregnant...all d best

[Heather5]

That has happened to my DH, too. For some reason, some of his samples were much lower than others. Since this was for an IUI, did he get the whole sample collected? Was he extra nervous? Did the person washing the sperm say anything about agglutination (clumping)? Did he abstain for a couple of days before the IUI? These are just a few things that can affect the sperm count...

[Louie1975]

Thanks for your response cutepoppy.  His morphology is above the cut off.  Motility was an issue in the samples as well.  37%, 39% and 41%.  However because we are doing IUI we were told the motility isn't such of an issue (we were initially concerned with this).  

You are right it only takes one!  There just seem to be so many friends/celebrities who get pregnant just lookin at their partner and we have been TTC since Oct 09.  Will stay positive and see what happens in a week or so.

[Louie1975]

Thanks for your response Heather5.  Yes I am under the impression that the whole sample was collected (I wasn't told otherwise).   To be honest he said he wasn't nervous and was just glad to get it out as he abstained for 3 days!  

Thanks for your suggestions re clumping and I will certainly ask the question.