DRUGS HOLD NEW HOPE FOR IMPOTENT MEN.Byline: Associated Press Millions of impotent American men are about to get a treatment revolution - new pills that promise to restore sexual function without the discomfort and embarrassment of traditional therapies. The first oral medicine for impotence - a drug that can cause erections within 20 minutes of swallowing the pill - could be sold by April, impotence specialists said Monday. ``Some of these drugs are very potent, very unique,'' said Dr. Harin Padma-Nathan of the University of Southern California The U.S. News & World Report ranked USC 27th among all universities in the United States in its 2008 ranking of "America's Best Colleges", also designating it as one of the "most selective universities" for admitting 8,634 of the almost 34,000 who applied for freshman admission and director of The Male Clinic in Santa Monica. ``We could combine them in a cocktail . . . some to work in the brain and some to work locally, for the best effect.'' Patients who have tried the experimental pills say they work easily. ``My wife said it was like I was Tarzan,'' said Alfred Pariser of Los Angeles, who was impotent for a year following prostate cancer prostate cancer, cancer originating in the prostate gland. Prostate cancer is the leading malignancy in men in the United States and is second only to lung cancer as a cause of cancer death in men. surgery until he tried Viagra, the drug that works in 20 minutes. Between 10 million and 20 million American men suffer impotence at some point in their lives. Impotence increases with age, and some 80 percent is caused by disease, particularly diabetes and heart conditions that restrict blood flow, said Dr. Irwin Goldstein of Boston University. Impotence also can be psychological or a side effect of certain drugs. Impotence is highly treatable, but there are drawbacks: penile implants require surgery; vacuum-style devices that force blood into the penis interrupt lovemaking; injecting drugs into the penis or inserting a drug-carrying pellet into the urethra urethra (y  rē`thrə), canal in most mammals that carries urine from the bladder to the outside of the body; in the male it also serves as a genital duct. can be painful, and the injections sometimes cause hours-long erections. Now three experimental pills promise to erase the discomfort, doctors told reporters meeting at the National Institutes of Health Monday: Pfizer Inc.'s Viagra, or sildenafil sildenafil /sil·den·a·fil/ (sil-den´ah-fil?) a phosphodiesterase inhibitor that relaxes the smooth muscle of the penis, facilitating blood flow to the corpus cavernosum; used as the citrate salt to treat erectile dysfunction. , blocks an enzyme found mainly in the penis that breaks down a chemical produced during sexual stimulation. The longer that chemical, called cyclic GMP cyclic GMP n. Cyclic guanosine monophosphate; a cyclic nucleotide of guanosine that acts at the cellular level as a regulator of various metabolic processes, possibly as an antagonist to cyclic AMP. , stays around, the better chance of an erection. While Viagra works in the penis, Tap Pharmaceuticals Inc.'s apomorphine ap·o·mor·phine n. A poisonous, white, crystalline alkaloid derived from morphine and used medicinally to induce vomiting. apomorphine an alkaloid from morphine. ``works completely in the brain,'' Padma-Nathan said. Apomorphine affects chemicals in the brain region associated with initiating erections. Doctors discovered the effect in 1869, but found the drug better for poison victims because it also caused serious nausea and vomiting Nausea and Vomiting Definition Nausea is the sensation of being about to vomit. Vomiting, or emesis, is the expelling of undigested food through the mouth. . Vasomax is an oral version of a current injection drug that dilates penile penile /pe·nile/ (pe´nil) of or pertaining to the penis. pe·nile adj. Of or relating to the penis. penile of or pertaining to the penis. blood vessels. |
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