December 4th, 2009
Doctors are being advised to prescribe oral phosphodiesterase type 5 (PDE-5) inhibitor canadian prescription drugs like Viagra, Cialis and Levitra for men who suffer from erectile dysfunction—unless their patient is on nitrate therapy–decided the American College of Physicians.
A new guideline has been created that includes advice such as: erectile dysfunction (ED) drugs should be prescribed based on a patient’s personal preferences. These preferences can include price of drugs, simplicity of use and side effects.
The final deciding factor of choosing between the three main ED drugs remains up to the patient. “The evidence is insufficient to compare the effectiveness or adverse effects of different PDE-5 inhibitors for the treatment of ED because there were only a few head-to-head trials,” says the lead author of the guideline Dr. Amir Qaseem, senior medical associate with the ACP.
Qaseem and fellow colleagues spent time analyzing the outcomes of 130 studies that tested PDE-5 inhibitors alone or combined. The conclusion found that drug treatments led to statistically important and relevant improvements in sexual intercourse and erectile function in men with ED regardless of its cause (diabetes, depression, prostate cancer…)
In all, the drugs were tolerated well and the only side effects noticed were mild, including headaches, flushing, nausea or runny noses.
The guideline for doctors has been published in Annals of Internal Medicine’s Oct 20 issue.
There has been no definite evidence about effectiveness of hormonal blood tests and treatment in patients with low testosterone, and the ACP does not recommend for or against routine tests. The final word is that doctors should form decisions based on hormone levels related to a patient’s clinical symptoms, such as decreased libido, fatigue, premature ejaculation, etc… and physical signs that are suggesting hormone problems.
