Sports enhance sexual function

According to the latest study published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine, men engaged into physical activity are less prone to erectile dysfunction than those who are inactive.

The study was performed among men aged 18 to 40. The participants of the study took part in 2 experiments: the Paffenbarger Physical Activity Questionnaire and the International Index of Erectile Function.

Both tests clearly showed that men under 40, who exercised, have improved results as compared to those over 40 who lived sedentary lives.

Commenting on the findings, Dr. Wayland Hsiao, assistant professor of urology at Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, GA, said: “We hope that early screening for ED may be a gateway issue to help motivate young men to live healthily on a consistent basis so that they can possibly avoid health issues associated with a sedentary lifestyle, such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease.”

A number of other studies that evaluate the correlation between sexual function and lifestyle have been published earlier by various researchers.

Canadians and Sex

A recent survey conducted in Canada, United States, United Kingdom, Denmark, Finland, Austria and other European countries, found out that Canadians are the least spontaneous in their sexual lives. The vast majority of respondents (67%) prefer to have sex on Saturdays, and usually have it 1.35 times a week.

Almost half of Canadians like evening sex, meaning they get into bed after 6 p.m.

Those who try to avoid sex typically cite tiredness and fatigue as their excuses. Also, women tend to complain about headaches, while men say they suffer from muscle pain. Interestingly enough, men are more likely to suspect women of excuses than vice versa.

The survey was performed by Eli Lilly and Co., the manufacturer of one of the most popular erectile drugs, Cialis. Over 13,000 men and women from the countries listed above participated in this online survey.

Commenting on the findings, Dr. Gerald Brock of the University of Western Ontario, said: those who do not have enough sex “simply don’t have the same quality of life as individuals who have a healthy sex life, There’s no question that when you restore that sexual activity and address their concerns, all measures show an improvement in overall quality of life.”

ICD

Dr. Steven Cook and his colleagues recently found out that men with implanted cardioverter defibrillators are more prone to suffering from erectile dysfunction than men who do not have similar heart-related issues.

Patients with heart implants have a high anxiety level when it comes to sex because they think the device might give them a painful shock. Such thoughts, evidently, result in poor male potency.

The research was performed among 151 men, of whom 41 had heart implants (also known as ICDs).Men with ICDs were found to have lower sexual function and satisfaction scores.

In the opinion of the authors of the research and other healthcare professionals, men need to talk to their physician about physical activities with ICDs installed.

Dr. Albert Levy of Mount Sinai School of Medicine, says: “When you have sex, it’s the equivalent of climbing stairs,” Levy said. “If someone is capable of climbing stairs without their ICD kicking in, they should be able to have sex.”

The results of the study are to be discussed at the meeting of the American Heart Association, which is to be held on November, 15th.

Father and son

A recent research by AARP, formerly the American Association of Retired Persons, a US-based organization dedicated to enhancing quality of life for people over 50, suggests that men who have children face less heart problems than those who do not.

Even though there’s no direct relationship between fatherhood and health-related issues, there are many factors that helped scientists make this conclusion.

For example, fathers are more concerned about their health and lifestyle than men who do not have kids. They eat healthier food and exercise more often.

Also, in the opinion of doctors, infertility in men might be only a symptom of or a predisposition to other health problems.

Maybe having children causes men to have healthier behaviors, so fathers will live longer,” said Dr. Michael Eisenberg, lead study author and assistant professor of urology at the Stanford University School of Medicine.

In a separate research, doctors found out than women who drink at least 4 cups of coffee a day are less likely to suffer from depression.

The study was published in the Human Reproduction journal.

Sexual disorders

Results of the recent research, published on August 23rd in the British Journal of Urology International, suggest that men suffering from erectile dysfunction oftentimes face other sexual problems as well.

As such, the study showed that 65% and 58% of men with ED have problems with orgasm and ejaculation accordingly. Unlike erectile dysfunction, these conditions cannot be treated with pills like Viagra or Cialis and need to be addressed in another way.

“Conditions such as orgasm and ejaculation problems are physiologically complicated to treat,” says Andrew Kramer of the University of Maryland Medical Center. He thinks that a drug, which will help men get orgasm, will not be developed any time soon. Therefore, those are psychological problems associated with ejaculation and orgasm that have to be resolved first.

The study was carried out among 12,000 men diagnosed with ED, so its results should be considered as significant.

The study was sponsored by Eli Lilly, the pharmaceutical company that developed Cialis, one of the most popular ED treatments.

Low self-esteem?

A recent study carried by the Taiwanese Association of Andrology (TAA) revealed that men with low self-esteem are at a greater risk of sexual disorders like erectile dysfunction and premature ejaculation.

The survey of 3,282 men performed by the researchers showed that 40% of men give themselves a 3 or even lower on the erection hardness scale (EHS). Meanwhile, a normal value for healthy erection is 4 and up.

Interestingly enough, the proportion of those suffering from ED was twice as high among men with low self-esteem. A lot of men who gave themselves a 3 on EHS also reported to experience other health issues, like high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity, and strokes.

In the opinion of Jiaan Ban-pin, one of the researchers from the TAA, EHS rating is one of the ways to determine man’s satisfaction with most aspects in life and his attitude towards ideal sex. He suggests that men who suffer from ED or premature ejaculation pay attention to their psychlogical state in addition to taking ED pills like Viagra or Cialis.

Natural antioxidants

A new study revealed that antioxidants might help treat infertility, including erectile dysfunction. Similar research has already been carried out earlier, but its results were incomplete.

Now, scientists from the Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University and the Madrid Institute for Advanced Studies in Spain showed that nutritional therapies might have a significant treatment effect on infertility in both, men and women.

As such, Tory Hagen of the Linus Pauling Institute, said that “if oxidative stress is an underlying factor causing infertility, which we think the evidence points to, we should be able to do something about it.” He said that lab studies, which focused on new antioxidants like lipoic acid, were very promising.

Scientists, who led the research, are determined that erectile dysfunction in men and infertility in women can be treated with the help of antioxidants should new approaches be developed and implemented.

If you want to learn more about the findings of the research by the Linus Pauling Institute and Madrid Institute for Advanced Studies, please, refer to the latest issue of the Pharmacological Research journal.

Sexy drinks are dangerous

Today, on July 18th, Food Standards Australia New Zealand issued a warning to all men looking to improve their sex lives.

They were recommended to steer clear of so-called “sexy drinks” like Sexpresso and Rock Hard, which are based on caffeine and analogues of Viagra.

The watchdog held several tests of these drinks, which proved that a substance similar to Viagra’s active ingredient, sildenafil, is contained in both drinks. It is important to note that, according to Australian laws, adding such substances to foods and drinks is illegal, which is probably the reason why the drug was not listed as an ingredient on the labels of Sexpresso and Rock Hard.

Commenting on the possible danger these drinks pose to men’s health, experts at Food Standards Australia New Zealand said that “consumers who are using this product should stop taking it immediately and speak to a doctor if they are experiencing side effects.” They also highlighted that men and women should be extremely careful about foods and drinks that are sold without prescription and claim to treat physical conditions. Consumption of such foods and drinks can only be possible upon approval from a doctor.

Men's dental hygiene

A recent study published in the Journal of Sex and Medicine suggests that erectile dysfunction might be linked with poor dental hygiene.

Not only can bad breath, crooked teeth and bleeding gums be aesthetically unpleasant; such dental conditions as periodontitis might negatively affect men’s sexual health.

The research, the subject of which, by the way, were rats, revealed that increased inflammation levels might lead to heart disease. The latter, in its turn, have long been linked with erectile dysfunction.

Moreover, periodontitis in rats, and, supposedly in men, leads to low level of eNos enzymes. This enzyme is responsible for the production of nitric acid that relaxes blood vessels and increased blood flow to the penis.

Of course, many scientist remain skeptic of the findings by saying that linking poor penile performance with poor dental hygiene is too much, the authors of the research are determined that this might be the case. They plan on doing more research on humans.

The research published in the Journal of Sex and Medicine was only carried on male rats and has nothing to do with female dental hygiene and ladies’ sexual health.

Viagra is produced in 25, 50, and 100 mg tablets, which contain, respectively, 25, 59, and 100 mg of sildenafil citrate.

As opposed to other ways of erectile dysfunction treatment which consist in injections into the penis or other medical procedures, Viagra is a simple and easy-to-use preparation. When using Viagra, you just take one pill before having coitus.

The mechanism of Viagra effect is simple: the preparation increases the quantity of blood arriving to the penis. This helps a man to cause natural erection. Viagra has its effect only in thy case when a man is feeling natural sexual arousal, and when the coitus ends, the penis naturally relaxes. In other words, Viagra affects only natural mechanisms of erection and in this there’s its undeniable up-to-dateness and the secret of great popularity.

The discovery of Viagra became the third greatest “accidental” opening in medicine – after the opening of X-rays and penicillin. These discoveries were awarded Nobel Prize. This high award was also given in 1998 to the research people who discovered, in addition, the characteristics of Viagra.

The history of Viagra started in 1992 in Great Britain in the township Pfizer Sandwich in the course of pharmacology research work of Pfizer Corporation. The research people were probing the new pharmaceutical substance – Sildenafil Citrate – which was developed as the remedy for medication of some heart diseases.

The scientists expected that sildenafil citrate will promote increasing blood inflow to the cardiac muscle and lowering blood pressure. But it was noted that sildenafil citrate doesn’t influence much neither blood circulation in cardiac muscle (myocardium) nor blood pressure. At the same time it was found out that many patients of male sex taking part in the testing refused to return sildenafil pills, despite of the ending of the experiment. The reason was one among all the patients – they all noted erection recovery. Thus, in spite of the minimum influence of the new medicine on the blood circulation in myocardium, sildenafil caused perceptible blood inflow to male genital organs.

The research people of the pharmaceutical Pfizer Corporation took this unexpected quality quite seriously and managed to recognize powerful preparation for erection dysfunction combat. The new preparation was named Viagra – the name appeared as the result of junction of the words “Vigor” (power, energy, force) and Niagara – the most massive waterfall in North America.

Since 1993 prolonged clinical trials necessary for proving Viagra characteristics started. As the result of these trials high effectiveness of Viagra and its safety were proved. And after all on the 27th March, 1998 the USA Medical Supply Department approved the use of Viagra. The effect of the preparation was estimated among more than 3000 men from 19 to 87 of age during the research work of erectile dysfunctions held in all the countries of the world. The average duration of dysfunction was about 5 years (from 6 months to 26 years), while the nature of this malfunction was of organic, psychogenic, and combined psychogenic-organic origin.

The results of these research work show that Viagra is effective for erectile function recovery and for the improvement of successful coitus rates among a great number of the patients including those having diabetes, spinal cord injuries, and other concomitant clinical states, as well as among the patients taking a whole number of medicaments.

According to numerous clinical trials and testing the preparation on volunteers suffering from different types of erectile dysfunction, sildenafil citrate is quite effective. But some nuances should be noted.

Unfortunately, there exists no preparation able to treat all the diseases, in this case all the types of erectile dysfunction. Viagra isn’t a panacea either; it can help in the majority of cases, but not all the patients. Viagra is effective among the patients suffering from atherosclerosis, the injury of nerves of penis vessels, or diabetes.

Moderate results are observed among the patients with pathological venous drainage. In each of the enumerated cases only a doctor can organize erectile dysfunction treatment in the right way. He can prescribe the necessary treatment regimen and choose the best medicine.