Question: How can drugs for high blood pressure affect my sex life?
Answer: Erectile dysfunction is common in the general population be it male or in the case of females sexual dysfunction. When you look at it, a number of the blood pressure medications we use are associated with the onset of erectile dysfunction. Now that can be a diuretic, a beta blocker, or so-called peripheral alpha blockers -- those are three drugs commonly linked to erectile dysfunction. Alternatively we now appreciate that erectile dysfunction marks abnormalities in blood vessels elsewhere in the body -- for example coronary artery disease.
So one should always be careful that in the setting of erectile dysfunction, that there's careful surveillance for involvement of blood vessels elsewhere in the body and not just simply attribute it to the blood pressure medication alone.
Sometimes this happens of its own accord. And what's simmering beneath the surface is just brought out by the medication, but there's something there from the get go.