How does Viagra work?

Viagra is potentially the best known drug of all time. There are literally billions of spam e-mails sent on a daily basis to advertise Viagra. In actual fact this has become such a problem that Pfizer, the manufacturer and maker of Viagra, have tried to address this situation by educating people in the fake forms of Viagra. Pfizer have claimed that their website actually sells on average nine Viagra pills every second and that equates to almost 300,000,000 tablets every year. They have, additionally, spent many millions of dollars advertising Viagra.

In its simplest form, Viagra will enable a man who is sexually stimulated to achieve an erection. If a man’s penis is in full working order it will go through three stages prior to ejaculation. Initially the man will become sexually aroused, then the penis will respond to this by becoming erect, and finally by stimulating the penis the man will eventually ejaculate. Even though this process seems fairly simple, unfortunately the second and third stages of this process have been known to cause many men difficulties.

Viagra is mainly used as a prescription medication that is used to treat erectile dysfunction. It actually works by blocking the chemical PDE5, which is responsible for reversing the effects of an erection. This, in turn, results in many chemicals that are responsible for producing an erection remaining inside the penis. The muscles of the penis will not constrict and therefore blood will remain in the penis for far longer. This, of course, will allow a man to maintain an erection for a longer period of time. However, as mentioned, the penis must first be stimulated for Viagra to have any effect.

The main reason that Viagra will not work if the penis is not stimulated is mainly due to the fact that the chemicals that cause an erection will first need to be released into the penis. These specific chemicals are only ever released once a man is aroused and unfortunately Viagra does not have any effect on the actual release of these chemicals. It simply allows these chemicals to stay in the penis for longer.

One question that is often at the back of many men’s minds is how quickly Viagra will work once it has been taken. Unfortunately this will very much depend on the individual and can vary. However there have been many clinical studies on the subject and on average it took as little as 14 minutes for Viagra to begin to work. The majority of men will find that it works within a maximum time of 30 minutes. The penis and its response to Viagra will begin to reduce after approximately 2 hours however it has been known to have a stimulating effect up to 4 hours.

In order to increase the blood flow to the penis there are only three ways to achieve this:

  1. You will need to increase the amount of nitric oxide that is produced in the penis
  2. You will need to increase the amount of cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP) that is produced in the penis in direct response to nitric oxide
  3. You will need to eliminate the enzyme phosphodiesterase (PDE) in the penis which will therefore allow the build up of cGMP

Viagra will basically work on the third principle here. It helps to eliminate the PDE which will then allow the cGMP to build up inside the penis. The more cGMP that is produced, the greater the blood flow will be inside your penis. We are now aware that the greater the blood flow is, the better you can expect your erection to be.

You should also be aware that there may be certain side-effects from Viagra. Pretty much every drug on this planet will cause some form of side-effects, and unfortunately Viagra is no different. Although Viagra is intended to block PDE5 specifically, it will also have an effect on PDE6. This is the enzyme that is used in conical cells in the retina and therefore Viagra may have an effect on the way you view colors. This is most obvious when viewing blue and green colors and you may often view everything with a bluish tinge for a number of hours. This is the very reason that pilots cannot take Viagra 12 hours prior to flying.

Another side-effect is commonly found in people who take drugs like nitroglycerin, especially for angina. Nitroglycerin is intended to increase the amount of nitric oxide inside the body, just the same as Viagra does. Unfortunately if you take both drugs together the increased amount of nitric oxide inside your body can cause problems. Other potential side-effects may include headaches and even heart attacks. This is the main reason that Viagra is a prescription drug as opposed to an over-the-counter medication, as your doctor will need to be fully aware of your medical history prior to prescribing Viagra.

Last updated on Mar 16th, 2011 and filed under Drugs and Medications. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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