Reverse Vasectomy - Deciding to Have Children Again

A man may choose to get a reverse vasectomy for a number of reasons including wanting to have more children after a remarriage or because their own children died prematurely after an unfortunate incident. But not all men can be ideal candidates for this kind of procedure. For starters, he should be below 40 years of age and the initial vasectomy should have been done less than ten years ago.

The doctor must do a thorough examination of you before agreeing to do the reverse vasectomy. There should be little to no scar tissue that has formed after the first vasectomy. Because this type of surgical procedure can be quite costly, you need to have the financial means to cover it if your insurance company or health care plan refuses to do so.

You may opt to have it done with local anesthesia so you will not need to be confined and can save on the hospital stay, cost of medication and the fee for the anesthesiologist. But even then, the delicate microsurgery that a reverse vasectomy entails often comes with high surgical fees.

When you meet your surgeon or urologist for an initial consultation regarding the vasectomy, make sure that you discuss other options for having a child with your partner. If significant health risks related to age or other existing medical conditions are present in your or your partner, then adoption can be your only solution.

Aside from a reverse vasectomy, you can also ask your physician about in vitro fertilization. He or she will be able to discuss the pros and cons of such a procedure with you and present you with the success rates compared to a reverse vasectomy. If time is not on your side, then an in vitro fertilization, although slightly costlier should be your best bet. But if you would like a permanent solution to sterilization and envision having several children, a reverse vasectomy is still the top solution.

Once you have decided and the reverse vasectomy is completed, there are other precautions that must be taken post-surgery to ensure success. Like all kinds of surgery, you need to refrain from engaging in strenuous activities and sports especially those that involve lifting weights at least for seventy-two hours after the surgery. Your doctor will also ask you to abstain from sexual activity for a period of about five days to a week after the surgery.

The success rate of restoring the flow of sperm to join with the semen is higher than the eventual pregnancy rate that occurs after a reverse vasectomy. After six months, if sperm is still not found in the semen, then there has been a failure of the operation and there may be a need to do it again or resort to other pregnancy methods.