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Heart Patients’ Meds Not Responsible for Impotence

Some patients worry that the drugs they’re taking to lower cholesterol or blood pressure might increase the possibility of developing erectile dysfunction. However, a new Canadian study suggests that’s not likely.

The study involved about 2,000 men who were taking a cholesterol-lowering statin drug, a blood pressure-lowering medication, or both. The statin the men took was Crestor (rosuvastatin), and the blood pressure drug was a combination of candesartan and hydrochlorothiazide, sold in the United States as Atacand/HCT. Comparison groups took placebos.

The nearly six-year study found no link between the drugs and the development of erectile dysfunction. One physician who reviewed the findings said there’s a valuable lesson here for physicians and patients. Benjamin Hirsh, MD, director of preventive cardiology at Northwell Health’s Sandra Atlas Bass Heart Hospital in Manhasset, New York, notes that nearly 58% of male heart patients in the study had previously complained of impotence prior to the start of the drug trial.

“Therefore, asking patients about erectile dysfunction symptoms prior to starting certain medications reduces the likelihood of subsequently attributing symptoms of erectile dysfunction to a new medication,” Hirsh says.

The new study was led by Philip Joseph, MD, BASC, FRCPC, an assistant professor in the division of cardiology at McMaster University department of medicine in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. He says that prior studies had pointed to high blood pressure and high cholesterol as being associated with erectile dysfunction, but there’s been limited study into whether heart medications affect erectile dysfunction risk, either positively or negatively.

Joseph says the new study suggests that heart medications don’t increase the risk for impotence, and “lowering these critically important cardiac risk factors using these medications [also] has little impact on changes in erectile function.”

The findings were published in the January issue of the Canadian Journal of Cardiology. Joseph believes the findings should provide clarity for heart patients dealing with erectile dysfunction.

“Men who develop erectile dysfunction while on such medications commonly attribute their symptoms to the medications,” Joseph says. “Our findings suggest that these two medications do not negatively impact erectile function, which should be reassuring to men who are taking them.”

Nachum Katlowitz, MD, director of urology at Staten Island University Hospital in New York City, who reviewed the study, says one important and perhaps disheartening finding was that drugs used to improve heart health “did not restore penile function” for men with erectile dysfunction.

That means physicians may “need to make changes earlier” to help these men, Katlowitz says. “This perhaps might be at the first sign of erectile dysfunction, hoping to prevent progression and, if possible, reverse any nonpermanent changes," he says. More study into how effective this type of earlier intervention might be would be valuable, he says.

— Source: Canadian Journal of Cardiology