DRUGS that prevent millions of heart attacks a year can also make men
impotent. Researchers who discovered the link with the drugs, known as statins,
urge family doctors to warn patients about the unwanted side effects whenever
they prescribe them.
The link was discovered by John Harvey and his colleagues at the University
of Wales College of Medicine鈥檚 unit at the Maelor Hospital in Wrexham. Most of
the men affected were in their mid-50s, though some were as young as 30. More
than half of the 220 men identified by Harvey recovered their virility after
their doctors switched them to different types of statins, but the rest remained
impotent.
Launched in the mid-1990s, statins prevent heart attacks in people with
abnormally high concentrations of cholesterol in their blood. The drugs block
production of cholesterol and help to flush it out of the body. Purging
cholesterol prevents the build-up of fatty deposits in arteries, which form
life-threatening blockages.
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In trials of the drugs, manufacturers found that statins could halve the risk
of heart attack. Concentrations of low-density lipoprotein (LDL), the 鈥渂ad鈥�
cholesterol linked with heart disease, plunge by as much as 60 per cent in
patients who take statins. The drugs also raise levels of high density
lipoprotein, the 鈥済ood鈥� cholesterol.
Harvey discovered the link with impotence by accident through his research
into diabetes. Diabetes sometimes makes men impotent, so Harvey and his
colleagues wanted to check if medication increased the risk.
They found 57 cases linking statins and impotence from publicly available
data sources such as Medline. And in Britain, a further 163 cases had been
reported by family doctors to the Committee on Safety of Medicines. 鈥淲e were a
little surprised about the statins,鈥� says Harvey, who reported his findings this
week in Birmingham at the annual meeting of the British Endocrine Societies.
Simvastatin, marketed as Zocor by Merck Sharp & Dohme, caused 77 cases,
by far the most linked to a single drug. Of these, 44 recovered after switching
drugs. Harvey also found cases among patients taking a related class of
cholesterol-lowering drugs called fibrates, although he says this was known
beforehand.
鈥淲e鈥檙e not talking about a huge risk of impotence, but people should know
that it can and does happen,鈥� says Harvey. He says the drugs should continue to
be used because they save so many lives, but warns doctors to be vigilant. 鈥淚
think doctors should ask more specifically whether men have problems, because
men seldom volunteer information about impotence,鈥� says Harvey.
The British Heart Foundation says the risk of impotence is small. A
spokeswoman for Merck Sharp and Dohme says there were some cases of impotence in
its study of Scandanavian men but they were not statistically significant.