Do vasectomies sometimes fail to prevent pregnancy?

Do vasectomies sometimes fail to prevent pregnancy?

Philip Werthman, FACS (Director, Center for Male Reproductive Medicine) gives expert video advice on: Can a vasectomy be reversed?; Do vasectomies sometimes fail to prevent pregnancy? and more...

Vasectomies can fail to prevent pregnancy. It is very important for men, after they've had a vasectomy, to provide sperm samples until the sperm are absent from the ejaculation; Until they become asospermic. It can take awhile. Sperm live upstream in the vas from where the doctor makes the cut, and it can take six weeks to three months, sometimes longer, for all that sperm to get flushed out or die. If you were to do a vasectomy on someone and do a sperm count the next day, the sperm count would be completely normal. So it is important for men to realize that until they have gone back and done the appropriate follow up testing, they need to use contraception, otherwise the vasectomy will fail to prevent pregnancy.