As you probably know Viagra is a prescription-only drug that combats erectile dysfunction(which you may also know as impotence). However this isn’t the actual name of the drug, rather Viagra is its brand name, the real name being sildenafil citrate; although it will still help all you men out their gain and maintain an erection for penetrative sex. You may also want to know about alternatives, which include Cialis, Levitra, Spedra and Sildenafil, and all produce the same effect.
Know you know all the basics about it it’s time to go into the specifics about how it works. As you probably already know, an erection is when there is increased blood flow to the penis, and Viagra is all about increasing the blood flow to that region. It does this by causing the muscles in a man’s penis to relax, allowing more blood to flow there, as with impotence what happens is that interrupts the process of your brain sending signals to your penis to relax its muscles. However Viagra does not act as a sexual stimulus so you may need further aphrodisiacs to unlock its true potential.
To actually make sure it produces its desired effect there are some steps you must take. Firstly, you must take Viagra should be taken an hour before sexual intercourse on an empty stomach, as eating will make sure that the Viagra will act slower, as fats make it less effective. Secondly, you should never drink more than one or maybe two units of alcohol as this will make Viagra much less effective and increase the risk of side effects, which I’ll talk about later. And you should never have more than one tablet at a time without consulting your doctor, as well as never taking within 24 hours of taking Sildenafil, Cialis, Spedra or Levitra, which we know are similar drugs.
Viagra does also last four to five hours, although this doesn’t mean you’ll have an erection for four to five hours, rather you’ll have the ability to gain that improved erection for that period of time. It is very effective too, shown to work in 75% of men with erectile dysfunction, although this can potentially come with some side effects.
Side effects
The more common side effect is having nausea or a headache,with a 1 in ten chance you’ll get this, though the others are less common, with side effects such as indigestion and a stuffy nose being from a 1% to 10% chance. And there are also slightly more severe but very rare side effects such as nosebleeds, lightheadedness, stroke(or other heart related conditions), and increased or decreased blood pressure with a 0.01% to 0.1% chance of this happening. You can try and prevent some of these unpleasant things happening to you by making sure you avoid alcohol, recreational drugs and by potentially taking a lower dose. You should also never take Viagra if you are taking nitrate medicines as well as maintaining a 6 hour difference between taking alpha-blockers (for hypertension) and viagra if you do take them.
If Viagra does not work for you, there maybe more serious underlying causes of erectile dysfunction you may have. As such, you should definitely have yearly check ups for blood pressure, blood sugar for diabetes, blood lipid for raised cholesterol, and tests measuring your testosterone, thyroid and prolactin levels. Some of these tests may be free, or they will have a small fee attached to them, though having they are worth it as they can check if erectile dysfunction is an early symptom of the conditions I just talked about with the tests, such as raised cholesterol and diabetes.
I am self employed. General Practitioner in Melbourne, VIC. My special interest: male reproductive system.