It is just over ten years since that the Food and Drug Administration in the United States licensed Viagra for sale. Considering the profile that the drug has achieved in the media and success it has achieved around the world as an anti-impotence treatment it seems amazing that the drug has been on the market for such a comparatively short amount of time.
It has changed erectile dysfunction from an often embarrassing, untreatable condition to something that is, in the large majority of cases, easily managed. Viagra has been so successful that there is now no taboo in a man taking the drug; after all it has been taken by millions of men across the globe. It has actually managed to establish a reputation itself, first and foremost, as a drug that will enhance sexual performance rather than one that will simply allow it.
So Viagra is a relatively young drug, especially when compared with drugs that share a similar level of recognition such as aspirin or ibuprofen. Ten years down the line, however, you might not be surprised if there was little news to publish about the drug. After all we all know what it is used for do we not? Surely that is the end of the story. Well apparently not.
At The Online Clinic we like to keep you informed of the latest developments on all the medications that we prescribe and this, of course, includes Viagra. If you look back over the Viagra section of the news blog you might be surprised to see that Viagra is still regularly making headline news in regard to its uses. This week is no different. Reuters has published a story that relates how scientists at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles have discovered that Viagra and Levitra (another anti-impotence drug) helped to treat brain tumours in rats. The increased blood flow to the tiny blood vessels of the brain caused by being given Viagra allowed chemotherapy drugs to pass more easily to the tumours in the rats’ brains. Rats which were just given the cancer drug adriamycin lived for an average of 42 days whilst those who were given the cancer drug in conjunction with Viagra lived for, on average, 52 days.
So, after ten years, Viagra is still making the news and proving to have uses far greater and far reaching that the one for which it is most widely known.