ED & Heart Disease: It's All in the Plumbing Part 3

I apologize for the absence but it's been quite the week.  I had the honor & privilege of serving as the chair of the AAFP's Geriatric Medicine conference held this past week in Albuquerque (actually Santa Ana Pueblo), NM.  While there, I spoke on several topics including erectile dysfunction, hypogonadism & heart disease, and had the opportunity to point out 2 recent studies linking erectile dysfunction to heart disease.  In looking through my personal stash of studies, I found over a dozen more looking at the link between the two.

With that in mind, I wanted to point out another review looking at erectile dysfunction in the cardiovascular patient published early online last week in the European Heart Journal.  I found it to be quite complete, comparing psychogenic vs "organic" ED.  The former is found more commonly in younger men who are much more concerned about performance in their search for a life partner while the latter is more common in the middle age to older male.  This review also includes a copy of the Sexual Health Inventory for Men (SHIM), also known as the International Index of Erectile Function (IIEF-5) which helps objectively stratify just how bad one's ED is.

Most important, this review includes a few graphics to explain the difference between penile, heart, brain & extremity blood flow.  In other words, while a blood vessel is a blood vessel is a blood vessel, the relative size of these various blood vessels helps explain why ED might serve as the canary in the coal mine.  So use this review for yourself or to help your patients better understand what's going on.  And in case you're wondering, the review quotes a 3 year lag time between diagnosis of ED and incident heart disease.  Get working improving your health!

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