Viagra Not A Cure For All Sexual Problems, Researchers Says
PROVIDENCE, RI -- March 8, 1999 -- Although some physicians are using Pfizer
Inc.'s Viagra(sildenafil) to treat the sexual side effects of antidepressant medications,
one of the drug's investigators warns against the practice because Viagra has not been
studied for that purpose, this month's issue of Psychopharmacology Update reports.
"If there is no erectile dysfunction, [Viagra] is not an appropriate drug," said Ridwan
Shabsigh, M.D., a clinical investigator and associate professor of urology at Columbia
University. "Whether that will help some other subtypes of patients with certain sexual
dysfunctions such as anorgasmia [inability to achieve orgasm], I doubt it. There is simply
no data."
Other researchers have found Viagra to be effective in a few patients who were taking
the antidepressants Zoloft or Prozac for depression or other mental disorders. According
to Kenneth Paul Rosenberg, M.D., a sex therapist and clinical assistant professor of
psychiatry and public health at Cornell University Medical Center, sildenafil may be
effective for men who are experiencing erectile dysfunction, but not for other sexual side
effects such as loss of sex drive.
The issue of Viagra use in women is of particular concern since no studies of its effects
have been conducted. Though Rosenberg did prescribe Viagra with partial success to a
female taking Prozac, he add he encourages the scientific community to go into research
using Viagra in women in a controlled, scientific environment."
"I would discourage the off-label use [of Viagra] outside the research environment until
further research becomes available," he said.
Among his precautions for prescribers, Rosenberg emphasises the importance of
screening patients for other drug therapies and obtaining a sexual history to screen for
other possible causes of dysfunction.
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