Viagra for women?

In light of the success of erectile dysfunction treatments for men, such as Viagra, Cialis and Levitra, the issue of orally administered drugs for sexual dysfunction in women is an ever increasing one. A study published in 1999 in The Journal of the American Medical Association found that 43 percent of women experienced some form of sexual dysfunction, compared with 31 percent of men. Many women searching for a solution to their lack of libido are trying out drugs such as Viagra.

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The male and female sexual organs are essentially the same, but are slightly modified by hormones during fetal development. The male scrotum is the same as the female vagina, only turned inside out. The male testes are the same as the female ovaries. The male penis is the same organ as the female clitoris. Therefore, it is not irrational to suppose that Viagra could simulate arousal in the female organs, by the same means it does in the male.

However many researchers say sexual problems are far more complex in women than in men, and it's unlikely Viagra will ever work as well for women. After eight years of work and tests involving 3,000 women, Pfizer Inc. announced that it was abandoning its effort to prove that the impotence drug Viagra improves sexual function in women. Although Viagra can indeed create the outward signs of arousal in many women, it seems to have little effect on a woman's willingness, or desire, to have sex, the researchers said. Viagra does not increase sexual desire, just the ability to achieve and maintain an erection. The problem, Pfizer researchers found, is that men and women have a fundamentally different relationship between arousal and desire. For men, arousal almost always leads to desire. So by improving a man's ability to have erections, Viagra measurably affects his sexual function. But arousal and desire are often disconnected in women. "There's a disconnect in many women between genital changes and mental changes," said Mitra Boolel, leader of Pfizer's sex research team. "The brain is the crucial sexual organ in women, he said.

Although there is little evidence that Viagra helps women who take it themselves to improve their love-life, Viagra may help pregnant women with placental insufficiency, by improving blood supply to the uterus. Some doctors also think it may have a slight effect in assisting conception in some forms of infertility - perhaps for the same reason.

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