Viagra May Help Women Restore Orgasms Lost to Antidepressants

[Pharma Newshound]

Source: Bloomberg.com

[Also see Pharma Marketing Blog post: "Will Viagra be Approved for Antidepressant-Related Sexual Dysfunction in Women?"]

By Nicole Ostrow

Women who have trouble getting sexually aroused as a side effect of taking antidepressants may be helped by Pfizer Inc.'s Viagra for impotent men, a study found.

The study, the first objective research to show a role for Viagra in boosting female sexual function, found that almost three times as many women taking the impotence pill had orgasms compared with those given a placebo. Previous studies hadn't shown a benefit from Viagra for women in general. The data appears in tomorrow's Journal of the American Medical Association.

As much as 70 percent of men and women who take antidepressants lose interest in sex or are unable to function sexually, a reason why many of them stop taking their medicines, according to researchers. While men may be prescribed impotence medicines such as Viagra, GlaxoSmithKline Plc's Levitra or Eli Lilly & Co.'s Cialis, women have had few proven options, said psychiatrist Harry Croft, the study's author.

``If sexual functioning is getting in the way of taking the medicines correctly and for a long enough time, then the use of Viagra, according to this study, may be a helpful antidote,'' said Croft, medical director of the San Antonio Psychiatric Research Center in Texas, in a telephone interview today. ``The solution is going to be to find new agents that don't produce sexual dysfunction. For now, this is another option that physicians can have to help their patients.''

Researchers in the study looked at 98 women on antidepressants whose average age was 37. The women in the study didn't have any sexual problems before beginning on antidepressants, Croft said.

Viagra or Placebo

The participants, randomly assigned Viagra or a placebo, were told to take the pill one to two hours before sexual activity for eight weeks. The women on Viagra were more likely to say they had an increase in orgasms and partner satisfaction compared with those taking the placebo. Overall, Viagra didn't increase their sexual drive or desire for sex, Croft said.

Seventy-two percent of the women who were given Viagra said they had an improvement in sexual function compared with 27 percent in the group given a placebo.

Sexual dysfunction in women is associated with decreased sexual interest, genital sensitivity and vaginal lubrication, according to the study. It is also associated with delayed or absent orgasm, pain during sex and reduced sexual activity.

Viagra works by relaxing blood vessels. In men, that improves blood flow to the penis, which is crucial to gaining and keeping an erection.

Pfizer tested Viagra in about 3,000 women before saying in 2004 that it wouldn't seek approval for use of the drug in women because studies about the medicine's effectiveness were inconclusive.

Different Women

The latest study was in a different population of women whose sexual dysfunction came only from the antidepressants and not from anything else, which may be why Viagra appeared to work, Croft said.

Pfizer, which sponsored the study through a grant, has no plans to seek regulatory approval for Viagra as a treatment for female sexual dysfunction, said spokeswoman Sally Beatty in a July 21 e-mail. The company is looking into other treatment approaches for women, she said.

Viagra sales totaled $1.76 billion in 2007, up 6 percent from 2006, New York-based Pfizer said in January. The drug was approved in 1998 and was the first impotence treatment available as a pill.

To contact the reporter on this story: Nicole Ostrow in New York at nostrow1@bloomberg.net