SOLNA, Sweden – Taking Viagra can do more than just benefit a man’s love life. A new study found that the erectile dysfunction drug could also help prolong a patient’s life.
Researchers at the Karolinska Institutet in Sweden report that men who have survived a heart attack can prolong their lives by taking the drug. In fact, the more they use it, the lower the risk of another attack.
Impotence can be an early warning sign of cardiovascular disease in healthy men. It is treated locally with alprostadil, which dilates blood vessels to make the penis stiff, or with so-called PDE5 inhibitors, such as Viagra or Cialis tablets. The pills are taken before sex and increase blood flow to the penis.
“Potency problems are common in older men and now our study also shows that PDE5 inhibitors can protect against heart attacks and prolong life,” study author Martin Holzmann of the Karolinska Institutet said in a statement to SWNS Media . “Protection was dose dependent, so the more frequent the dose of the PDE5 inhibitor, the lower the risk.”
Erectile dysfunction medications may protect against life threatening heart disease
Because Viagra and Cialis lower blood pressure, they were not recommended for men with coronary artery disease due to the risk of heart attack. But in 2017, Holzmann and colleagues showed that men who had a heart attack tolerate the drug well and that it even prolongs life expectancy and protects against stroke and heart failure.
In their new study, the team compared the effect of alprostadil and PDE5 inhibitors, including Viagra, in men with stable coronary artery disease. Patients had a stroke, balloon dilation, or coronary artery bypass graft surgery at least six months before starting treatment for erectile dysfunction.
“The risk of a new heart attack is greatest during the first six months, after which we consider coronary artery disease to be stable,” says Holzmann.
The study included 16,500 men treated with PDE5 inhibitors and just under 2,000 who received alprostadil. Data were collected from patient, drug and cause of death records. The results show that men who received PDE5 inhibitors lived longer and had a lower risk of new heart attack, heart failure, balloon dilation and bypass surgery than those who received alprostadil.
“This suggests that there is a causal relationship, but a registry study cannot answer that question,” says Holzmann. “It is possible that those who received PDE5 inhibitors were healthier than those who were taking alprostadil and therefore had a lower risk. To see if it is the drug that reduces the risk, we would need to randomly allocate patients into two groups, one who takes PDE5 and one who does not. The results we have now give us a good reason to embark on such a study. “
Since Viagra and other PDE5 inhibitors are available by prescription only in Sweden, they cannot be purchased over the counter.
But Holzmann hopes that men with coronary artery disease will not hesitate to discuss the matter with their doctor.
The research is published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
SWNS writer Laura Sharman contributed to this report.