erectile dysfunction

NCBI Study on "Green Viagra" Should Perk Up PETA Peck'a

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Fri, 2011-04-01 11:44

Via Patrick Morgan of Discover Blogs' NCBI ROFL

So THAT’S why Popeye’s bulge was so large.

The effect of spinach on penile tumescence

“Spinach has long been praised for its many beneficial nutrients. Although not as iron-rich as originally reported (a fallacy that has become entrenched in popular culture), recent evidence suggests that the consumption of spinach may increase flow to blood-rich areas, including penile tissue. (more…)

Source: Discover Blogs

Sadly for the competing spinach capitals of the world (Alma, Arkansas, and Crystal City, Texas, claim that distinction) the publication date is April 1, 2011.

On the other hand I really want to thank Patrick Morgan for posting a link to the original sources (sources that are usually, as in this case, funded with federal grants) rather than gated/paywall sites where only the abstract is free.

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The Kinsey Institute on What Condom Reluctance Might Really Indicate... And What to Do About It

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Tue, 2010-12-28 23:43

Echidne of the Snakes says

As the Kinsey Institute noted in a study this year, men who can't sustain an erection while wearing a condom are less likely to wear a condom while having sex. (Duh.)

Men who reported having sex with three or more partners in the past three months were almost twice as likely to report erection loss compared with men having fewer partners. These findings underline the importance of encouraging men to discuss condom use with new lovers.

Men who lost their erections were much more likely to remove condoms prematurely, or to report that the condoms broke. Earlier research showed that men who didn't know how to use a condom properly were more likely to report breakage.

Source: Echidne of the Snakes

That sounds about right. Sometimes I've had erection problems with condoms too. Although when that's happened it turns out there are roughly 10,000 other mutually orgasmic heterosexual activities that don't require them. No real reason to obsess about the one or two where they are. And, not to put too fine a point on it, sometimes when you do those things first it turns out you can get a condom on without erection loss.

Who ever said only women need to receive foreplay?

More to the point, who ever said only women enjoy receiving forplay?

Mmmm, foreplay.

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A (Possibly Stealth) Objection to Condom Use: Loss of Erection

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Wed, 2009-07-29 16:40

This week’s question for Em & Lo’s Wise Guys feature is “Is sex with a condom really all that bad?”

As usual the answers vary but the consensus tends to be… not all that bad, no, but not so great either. Reasons given by this week’s Wise Guys (disclaimer, I’m an occasional Wise Guy for Em & Lo) vary, as do those by men and women in comments. I was glad to see that some men are starting to be willing to talk about one that’s probably really important but not often discussed.

One downside of condoms I keep hearing about privately but not so much in open discussion is loss of erection. I’ve had a vasectomy, and been pretty much in long-term “fluid bonded” relationships, since just before concerns about HIV emerged so I don’t actually have a lot of experience with condoms. But even when I was an… um… perpetually upstanding young man it took a lot of gear-shifting to unwrap and properly put on a condom, and between the mental distractions, the time spent, and the fact that putting one on necessarily means you’re thinking about myriad consequences if something went wrong I’d often shrink to a point where penetration became difficult.

And since, as I discovered decades later, it’s actually not just me it would be very nice if there was more, and more open, discussion of the effect.

I’m guessing it’s an even bigger problem for men who already have other problems getting and keeping erections.

This isn’t to say I’m complaining about condoms, just that I’m guessing that at least part of male discomfort with the things comes not from the (ahem) straight-up loss of sensation but surprise or dismay about flagging, however briefly, when standard narratives about masculinity says it’s least supposed to happen. So, I guess, instead of complaining about condoms (which is pretty common) I’m complaining about the standard myths, narratives, and procedures involved in getting it on, and keeping it on, while putting it on. :-)

Again, obviously it’s not a problem for every man but it’s evidently a problem for quite a few of us. A little help with that would be handy.

For the record, for me anyway, if and when (usually when) my erection returned intercourse with a condom isn’t so less pleasant than intercourse without that I’d rather do without.

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Possible Benefit For Men From Low-to-Moderate Consumption of Alcohol

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Sun, 2009-01-25 11:33

Hortense of Jezebel says

So it turns out that alcohol consumption, once thought to be a leading cause of poor performance in the bedroom, actually improves a man’s sexual abilities, according to a recent study of 1580 Australian men.

“We found that, compared to those who have never touched alcohol, many people do benefit from some alcohol, including some people who drink outside the guidelines,’‘ says Dr. Kew-Kim Chew, who led the study at Western Australia’s Keogh Institute for Medical Research. After studying the habits of 1580 Australian men, it was found that men who drank within recommended guidelines had 30% fewer problems during sex than teetotalers, and, according to Clair Weaver of The Sunday Telegraph, “Even binge drinkers had lower rates of erectile dysfunction than those who never drank, although this type of drinking can cause other health problems.” And if that isn’t wacky enough, ex-drinkers were the ones with the highest rates of erectile dysfunction. (That sound you just heard was a million guys, giving up their New Year’s resolution to drink less. Or perhaps a “WTF” sigh from your straight-edge boyfriend.)

She wrote about it here.

Even though I’m a near teetotaler (hey, I drank an entire mixed drink just the other day… ok, ok, for the first time in maybe a year) and even though some of the reporting is of the breathless-as-usual type, I think it’s an entirely plausible conclusion.

One thing though. Hortense says

There’s no real reason given for the increase in performance that alcohol provides, though one would suspect a sense of relaxation and a lessened sense of anxiety helps a bit.

I actually agree that being easygoing and less stressed makes a difference and alcohol could make a difference there… although it’s just as likely that those who drink in moderation are just more easygoing anyway. But I’m pretty sure the answer’s actually a lot more straightforward.

It’s not that alcohol boosts performance (assuming “erection” is really a synonym of “performance”) it’s that alcohol reduces inability to perform. Here’s how.

There’s roughly one ounce in: a standard shot of whiskey, a standard bottle of beer, or a standard glass of wine. And numerous studies show that people who drink between one and (no more than) three ounces of alcohol a day have much lower rates of heart and arterial disease and death. (Actually much lower although, unfortunately for enthusiastic drinkers, the benefits plummet into deficit after three a day.)

Anyway, given that an awful lot of non-psychological difficulty with erection is all about cardiovascular health (Viagra is basically heart medication with a pronounced and profitable side effect) it’s not surprising that if small amounts of alcohol benefits the blood vessels of the heart it benefits the blood vessels of the penis as well.

So short-term relaxation notwithstanding certainly long-term you’d expect moderate drinkers to have more reliable erections than either non-drinkers or heavy ones.

And hey, that’s not to knock short-term benefits either. One of the first effects of alcohol** is vasodilation, and if constricted blood vessels make erections more difficult then (up to a point) less dilated blood vessels will make them less difficult.

One last thing, again, in addition to any possible psychopharmacological effects of alcohol: alcohol in general and beer in particular suppress production of something called antidiuretic hormone, with the result that you need to pee more. And I don’t know about anybody else but I’ve always found that erections are a lot easier, and a lot longer lasting, if my bladder is comfortably (but not uncomfortably) full. So unless that’s just me (and since I don’t have any erotic associations with urination or urination denial I’m pretty sure it’s not just me) then that could be yet another short-term, erection-related benefit of moderate alcohol consumption.

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The "No-Sex" Class and "Whoopie Pills"

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Tue, 2008-08-19 19:19

Anthony McCarthy of Echidne of the Snakes perhaps inadvertently shines a light on a classic “no-sex” class assumption.

You get used to filtering out commercials during the evening news but once in a while one breaks through your defenses. At the tail end of a Levitra commercial Sunday they included sudden deafness as a reported side effect. Sudden deafness now joins the list of announced effects of taking whoopie pills…

...the most interesting question is how far geezers, themselves, are willing to go to achieve rock hard erections into their late senescence. Would they accept having their head fall off, one wonders? Would they miss it? I’ve got to listen more closely tonight to hear if death is a reported side effect of aphro-geeziacs, by name or not. The answer may have already been reported.

Read the quote in context here.

A bit of desk clearing though. “Geezers?” “Late senescence?” “Aphro-geeziacs?” Sheesh, ageism much? Also, you don’t have to be geriatric to have problems with erections. Prostate cancer survivors, diabetics, men with heart disease, and men with untreated (and sometimes treated) depression experience it long before they’re “senescent,” and sometimes even before their hair thins or grays. But I digress…

So! I’ve mentioned elsewhere that I think it’s unfortunate that medication like Viagra is assumed to exclusively benefit men, or that contraceptive pills exclusively benefit women. McCarthy’s post reminded me of those strongly-gendered assumptions about the two medications and then, with his “whoopie pills” characterization, gave it a nice nudge forward. Check it out!

- Language of erection pills: frivolously facilitate (men’s) sexual enjoyment, i.e. “whoopie.” Because, you know, inside the “no-sex” class paradigm only heterosexual men enjoy sex. Their heterosexual partners merely endure it.

- Language of contraceptive pills: virtuously prevent (women’s) pregnancies. Because, you know, inside the “no-sex” class paradigm women’s interest in sex begins and ends at pregnancy.

But are women always and only interested in contraception only so they won’t get pregnant while passively lying back and thinking of England? And are men really always and only interested in erections for own pleasure? Sure, sometimes (and for those sometimes thank goodness for modern sensibilities about divorce.) But always? Only? The dominant paradigm says so. Why support it?

As I said in that previous post, for most heterosexuals both contraception (especially earlier in life) and erection medication (especially later in life) are as much for couples as for individuals.

—-

Quick question about Viagra and similar drugs: It looks like there really are a lot of unpleasant side effects and it sounds like they’re not all that rare either. So are they really consumed as recreationally as pop culture seems to think they are?

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Deconstructing Reconstruction

Posted by figleaf | Tags:
Thu, 2008-06-19 20:18

Sungold of Kittywampus has an interesting post up about reconstructive surgery after breast cancer vs. prostate cancer. I’d like to excerpt the whole thing but I’ll pull out the relevant bits as best I can.

According to Nate Jenkins at the AP, the state of Nebraska has decided that there’s no need to help men who are struggling with erectile dysfunction. It already stopped Medicaid payments for Viagra and related drugs when the federal government did the same in 2006. Now it’s excluding penile implants from Medicaid coverage as well.

From patient accounts that I’ve read, the erection resulting from the implant feels natural and pleasurable to both partners. Most of the men who have an implant wonder why they didn’t get the surgery sooner.

...

[A]part from the cringe factor, this is what they’re up against:

State Medicaid director Vivianne Chaumont said the change is consistent with a federal rule, approved in 2006, that barred the federal government from spending Medicaid dollars on erectile dysfunction drugs including Viagra. Nebraska followed suit a few months later and changed its rules to keep state Medicaid money from being spent on the drugs.

The federal government will still help pay for penile implants in states that choose to continue covering the procedure under their Medicaid plans.

Medicaid is meant to pay for the medical necessities of needy people and “sex is not medically necessary,” she said.

Do I even need to enumerate what’s wrong with this? ...

The ruling is also blatantly sexist. The state Medicaid program covers breast reconstruction, as most private insurers are required to do in accordance with federal law. Where’s the difference? Again, from the AP:

Chaumont, who moved to Nebraska about a year ago to take her current position, said she didn’t know why the decision was made to cover breast reconstruction under Nebraska Medicaid but added that it didn’t strike her as unreasonable.

“I don’t think breast cancer has anything to do with sexual dysfunction or sexual impotence,” she said.

I’m always uncomfortable when breast cancer and prostate cancer get pitted against each other. Both deserve adequate – no, generous – funding. It should never be a zero-sum game. And in this case, there’s no conceivable reason to cover one but not the other. Breast cancer has effective advocates. Prostate cancer remains largely in the shadows. That’s the only real difference.
...

At bottom, Chaumont is enforcing the idea that sex is optional and probably downright icky or evil. That sex is not for people who are aging or ill (even if an increasing number of prostate cancer patients are in their 40s and 50s). That sex is not a part of mental health. She doesn’t give a shit that their partners suffer nearly as much from the loss of marital “delight.” But what gave her the right to impose her own anti-sex views on Nebraskans who’ve had the double bad luck to be both poor and seriously ill?

What’s next? Will the state of Nebraska refuse to subsidize walkers or canes on the theory that walking is not a medical necessity? You can stay alive without walking, chewing, seeing, or fucking. And you can survive for decades without using your higher brain functions, including logic and empathy, as Chaumont’s decision proves. It seems that even thinking is not a medical necessity.

Read the quote in context here.

I’ve been interested in medical side effects that inhibit libido or sexual function, especially in men, for quite a while. Our narratives of men as the “sex class” are so pronounced that, as Sungold says, men who suffer such calamities often vanish from sight. (By some accounts the Bible forbids them going to church!) There’s even a pretty strong tradition, thoroughly embedded in the “no-sex” class by the way, that Viagra and penile implants are of interest only to men and that their partners have no, zero, none investment in their partner’s sexual functionality. And as I’ve mentioned elsewhere several times recently the issues is further complicated by sexist/ageist bias: menopausal women who are still interested in sex have been standing objects of derisive humor for generations.

Anyway, great post by Sungold about a topic we really should be having a lot more conversations about.

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