Over the last few months, I have noticed an increase in patients who take statin drugs to lower cholesterol, complaining of a decrease in libido and sexual performance. This most certainly is not a coincidence. An article written by Suzy Cohen, RPh explains that your medicine might be hampering your bedroom bliss!
Getting an erection requires healthy circulation. When blood flow is impaired to the heart, it’s called angina. When it’s impaired to the penis, it’s called “erectile dysfunction” or ED. These two conditions often go hand-in-hand because they are a problem of circulation, but physicians often treat them separately. In come the blood-thinners and sex pills. They get the job done; however, they don’t fix the problem of clogged pipelines and poor blood flow.
If you have ED, assume (until proven otherwise) that you have mild heart disease or pre-diabetes, even though the problem area is in your jeans. The focus of testing should be to rule out those conditions using hormone panels. Conventional blood tests won'’t paint a full picture of hormones such as cortisol, DHEA, testosterone, estradiol and progesterone. Statins makes sexual matters worse because they are drug muggers for testosterone hormone. You need a little T to get to the big O.
A 2010 study published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine supports this thought. The research from 3,484 men demonstrated that statin drugs reduces cholesterol, and therefore reduces testosterone levels. This crashes sex drive crash, and could lead to shrinking testicles. As your cholesterol numbers decline (and your doctor gets very happy), your interest in lovemaking flops (and your wife becomes very unhappy).
Losing weight will help tremendously because it improves blood flow and helps balance hormones. Many guys have a spare tire around the belly. If that’s the case, lose it. The more fat cells you have, the more estrogen you have. Estrogen causes water retention and high levels are tied to hundreds of diseases, including cancer. Furthermore, high estrogen causes low testosterone, relatively speaking and as you just learned, you need testosterone to woo your beloved.
If you would like more information about how statins not only reduce your cholesterol levels or about hormone testing give us a call or stop by either of our two locations and our pharmacists would be happy to talk to you!
Information from this blog was taken from the following article written by Suzy Cohen, RPh
