hey guys veena malik urologist and pelvic surgeon here did you know that
52% of men between the ages of 40 to 70 experienced erectile dysfunction and
what that means is that they are unable to have penetrated intercourse every
time they want to so no wonder there are a number of sexual enhancement pills
available on the market or sex pills for men to try do these actually work what's
in them and should you try we're gonna delve deep into that and if you like
what you see don't forget to hit that subscribe button and give me a big
thumbs up as a disclaimer I do not recommend any of these supplements but I
do know that there are people out there who are using them and I want you to
know what you're putting in your body also I think it's extremely important to
see a physician to get a diagnosis and be evaluated for your erectile
dysfunction it can be a sign of other really serious problems like heart
disease or problems with your blood vessels it can also help us find other
problems like low testosterone so it's important to do that and also we can
prescribe you medication that is FDA regulated for erectile function and
there is no such thing as a medication or supplement without side effects so I
know people think that these supplements are all-natural and they are but we
don't know what goes into them and they all also have side effects so that's not
a reason to forego seeing a physician so I see a lot of guys who come into my
office who've tried some sort of gas station pill some Rhino pill something
over-the-counter for their rectal dysfunction before they finally come see
me so before you try anything over the counter get on the FDA website they have
an entire list of medications that are on the naughty list are on the warning
list because they have undeclared ingredients or they have ingredients
that aren't supposed to be taken under the supervision of a physician like the
medications that we prescribed for erectile dysfunction so please avoid
those medications they are not safe the biggest issue with all of these
supplements is they are not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration so
there is no body of govern looking at what ingredients they're
putting on the label and comparing it to what's actually in the tablet that
you're taking so while the ingredients themselves that I'm gonna go over today
may be safe for you it may not be actually what's in the tablet itself so
you have to be very very careful also some of these are quite costly I know
back in the day that the cost of medications like sildenafil or Cabella
fell which are commonly known as viagra or the blue pill were more expensive and
so it was cost prohibitive to get those medications but now they are available
in generic form so if you see a physician you can get a generic
prescription for these medications and very often there are coupon programs or
compounding pharmacies that can give you even better discounts so it shouldn't be
cost prohibitive to get medications to help with your erections the first
medication we're going to discuss is called libido max and right on the cover
of this medication it says it as dr. developed male enhancement pills but I
went on the website and I couldn't find any information about a physician that
actually claims to have developed this medication so I'm not sure if that claim
is actually true also on the website I'm gonna read it directly from the website
it says this product contains a chemical known in the state of California to
cause cancer and/or birth defects or other reproductive harm so I would
immediately say please don't take this medication because there is a chance
that there are some medication that's been linked to cancer somewhere the
first active ingredient in this medication is l-arginine you're gonna
see this in a lot of the medications review and this is actually a precursor
for what's called nitric oxide and nitric oxide is a key component of the
ability for someone to obtain an erection so what happens is when you
have nitric oxide it allows the blood vessels to open up so that blood can
actually flow into the penis and cause tumescence or erection and so without
nitric oxide you can't have an erection so in theory this sounds like yes
l-arginine is an important part and could potentially improve erections they
have done Studies on this specific component they found that the data is
mixed probably a dose of five milligrams of l-arginine a day may be helpful but
it's most likely helpful in people who
already have some vessel disease so that it helps open up those vessels so
patients who have cardiovascular disease or other blood vessel diseases this may
be good for them there's also a number of side effects that actually none of
these pills seem to describe any side effects but when you look at the
individual ingredients they are listed as having some side effects including
cramping nausea abdominal pain or bloating and so you might get some
abdominal discomfort or belly discomfort when you take this medication you also
want to be careful taking this in if you have a history of asthma so asthma or a
reactive airway disease can actually be worsened by taking anything with
l-arginine in it also if you have low blood pressure liver disease or any
genetic conditions this can be concerning and so you want to avoid
these medications if you have any of those problems
the next active ingredient in this medication is horny goat weed you may
sometimes seem to see this ingredient labeled horny goat weed or you may
sometimes see it labeled with the first word being at the medium what this is is
an herb that has an active ingredient called urine and this active ingredient
helps to increase nitric oxide synthesis so that you have more nitric oxide
available to then obtain an erection there have been no randomized controlled
trials meaning that they haven't tested this particular herb extract with other
sugar pills or placebo pills to see if there's really truly a benefit so we
don't really know if this is effective but in theory that's how it works so
horny goat weed has low bioavailability poor absorption and a short half-life
and what does that mean well that means that when you take this medication or
this particular ingredient it doesn't stick around very long in the
bloodstream it doesn't really get absorbed into the bloodstream so that
it's useful and in that case it's probably not very effective there's also
some concern that over long periods of time you could get some dizziness with
taking it some vomiting dry mouth and in really severe circumstance if you're
taking a large quantity of it it can cause muscle spasms or difficulty
breathing so you do have to be careful with all these medications I keep saying
medications but what I really mean is supplements because these are not
medications they are not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration again
you want to be careful taking anything with horny goat weed in it if you have
low blood pressure if you're taking blood thinning medications or if you
have any clotting disorder the next active ingredient in this particular
supplement is yohimbe and yohimbe is extracted from the bark of an african
tree and it actually works in two ways it has a central effect meaning it works
on the brain and it blocks the receptors that decrease sexual arousal it also
works to increase nitric oxide this has been studied but it only enrolled a
small number of patients so it wasn't powered or it wasn't large enough to
detect a true difference between taking yohimbe versus taking just a regular
sugar pill so we don't know if it's completely effective if you're taking
any supplement with yohimbe in it you need to be careful if you have any sort
of psychologic to sword err if you have I already have anxiety if you are having
any prostate problems if you have diabetes or heart problems these sorts
of things can make it dangerous for you to take this sort of ingredient in a
supplement the next supplement that we're going to review is called the male
extra and this has two particular active ingredients the first one is pomegranate
and so does pomegranate actually improve erections so there was a study done
looking at men drinking pomegranate juice daily for four weeks compared to
people who didn't drink pomegranate juice because the thought is that
pomegranate is an antioxidant and this antioxidant can improve the
bioavailability which means that your body can see more nitric oxide when you
need to have an erection but in this study they didn't really find any
difference in a reptile function after drinking pomegranate juice daily for
four weeks so I don't think it really works also if you're taking anything
with pomegranate in it you need to be careful if you have certain medications
that are processed by the liver or if you have high blood pressure because it
can counteract with a lot of blood pressure medication the next ingredient
something we already covered in that l-arginine so mail extra I don't think
you're all that the next supplement we're gonna look at
is verectin and verectin has a disclaimer on its website which says
exactly the FDA has not evaluated any statements that are made by the company
and the supplement product is not intended to diagnose treat cure or
prevent any disease so again I think use this with caution because they're trying
to protect themselves obviously from any sort of liability but again these
supplements are not regular by the FDA so far I'm not really that impressed
by any of them although the ingredients you know may show some promise in some
studies nothing is a homerun and nothing is conclusive so let's see what this one
has this one has l-arginine which we already talked about as well as horny
goat weed which we talked about as well and it has another thing called maca
maca is a peruvian root vegetable that's
similar to a radish and this has been thought to increase sexual desire and
there is one study on maca where they gave it to 57 men and compared it to
placebo or taking some sugar pill and they found
that it was somewhat effective again small study and may be useful but we're
not really sure and so the nice part about maca is there's really not a lot
of side effects or contraindications at least that have been reported with this
particular ingredient the most common ones are usually mild and they're kind
of some moodiness some abdominal cramps and occasionally insomnia but again
there wasn't a whole long litany of things to look out for the next
ingredient is ginkgo biloba and ginkgo biloba is extracted from the leaves of
the ginkgo tree which is a Chinese tree and gingko biloba has been used for
years in ancient Chinese medicine and what they presume the mechanism of
action is that also increases the bioavailability of nitric oxide but
there was a study done a randomized study where they used gingko biloba and
compared it to placebo and they found that there was really no statistically
significant difference in erectile function so I don't think this really
work that well also there's a lot of reported
side effects of ginkgo biloba specifically a lot of anxiety a risk of
spontaneous bleeding and it really can contraindicate with a lot of other
medications that impact the central nervous system so medications for
psychological disorders anxiety and if it's taken with certain things like st.
John's wort or melatonin it can cause what's called hypomanic symptoms so
where you're potentially in a detrimental fashion really to awake and
energetic and doing things they're out of character for you so you have to take
this carefully next one is max performer and max performer has the same exact
statement on its website is directing which is which is exactly that the FDA
hasn't reviewed or condones any of the statements and this is not intended to
cure prevent or diagnose any sort of disease so again it's done for liability
but it points out that the FDA is not regulating this so this supplement has
three main active ingredients so it includes maca root powder which we
talked about it also includes horny goat weed and lastly it includes Korean red
ginseng or panax ginseng and this is also thought to increase the production
of nitric oxide and interestingly it's been studied pretty reasonably well and
they only looked at a small number of patients and in all these studies they
really focused on healthy men with erectile dysfunction so this may not
apply to people who have other comorbidities and in this study they
looked at 90 men and they found that it was 60% effective so of those who was
effective for they had an increase in penile rigidity girth the duration of
their erection and libido and overall satisfaction so could it be effective
potentially it's been studied but there are some really significant side effects
here the number one and most common side effect is insomnia and have to be really
careful when taking this with any sort of stimulus so caffeine sudafed things
like that because it can actually speed up your heart rate pretty quickly you
also have to be careful when you're taking it if you have any sort of
immunosuppressive condition so if you have lupus transplant
if you have diabetes this can be contraindicated in people with those
conditions as well the next supplement is advice and we've
already discussed all the main active ingredients in this particular
supplement and they include at the medium or horny goat weed ankle biloba
pomegranate and ginseng root extract and the last supplement we're gonna discuss
is vague rx interestingly this particular supplement has undergone an
actual clinical trial and so there is a one paper which goes over this exact
formulation and tries it against men who are taking a placebo medication so what
they did this particular trial was funded by an Indian pharmaceutical
company called Vedic life sciences and they took 76 men and they randomized
them to take either two tablets of veigar X or take a placebo and what they
found was they found improvement in five distinct domains
these included erectile function orgasmic function sexual desire
intercourse satisfaction and overall satisfaction so they the nice part about
this particular medication or supplement is that it's been studied in a
systematic way and published in the biomedical literature furthermore this
particular supplement is endorsed by a physician who I could actually find in
Google his name is dr. Steven Lam and he is the director of the men's health
clinic at New York University School of Medicine so I think that there is some
validity to this supplement it's been studied in this exact formulation and
it's being sold presumably in the exact formulation that it was studied and so
if you're gonna try one this may be a reasonable one they also didn't find any
really significant side effects in this study but again they only looked at
normal healthy men so you do need to talk to your doctor if you have other
comorbidities or other medical problems so they can see if this is safe for you
to take but what I do think is important is that men's health and the ability to
have normal erections is super important and seeing your doctor is can be very
helpful so please don't delay if you're nervous are concerned this is something
we do day in and day out and we're happy to help
you so please go see a doctor if you have a reptile dysfunction and we can
help you if you've taken one of these pills please comment below because I'm
curious to know what your experience was always remember to take care of yourself