Viagra and other male impotence medications with similar effects have been linked to several hundred cases of hearing impairment worldwide, according to a study by three British medical institutions.
Doctors from three hospitals: Charing Cross, Stoke Mandeville and Royal Marsden asked drug regulators in different countries whether they had received reports from men who had experienced hearing loss after taking Viagra.
According to the specialist publication Laryngoscope Reports, based on the materials obtained, doctors found 47 cases of a relationship between Viagra, Levitra and Cialis, and a type of deafness called sensorineural deafness, consisting in the rapid loss of hearing in one or both ears.
Sensory-nervous hearing loss most often results from an infection or exposure to loud noise. In about 1/3 of cases, irreversible effects occur.
Doctors haven’t figured out how Viagra affects hearing, but they don’t rule out that its loss may be caused by a chain of chemical reactions that Viagra produces in a part of the ear called the inner ear.
The average age of people who take drugs for the so-called Erectile dysfunction was noticed by deterioration, or hearing loss of varying degrees was 57 years, in the case of two men it was 37 years.
Doctors prescribing Viagra and other drugs with similar effects (in the UK the drug is available by prescription) need to bear in mind the potential side effects – Dr. Afroze Shah Khan of Charing Cross Hospital in West London.
The UK Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, for its part, believes that hearing loss from taking Viagra is very rare compared with the large number of men who use it.
Its spokesman told the British press that the adverse auditory reaction to Viagra did not prove that Viagra caused it.
The most common side effects of Viagra include temporary visual disturbances caused by changes in the functioning of the eye muscles, headache, nausea, diarrhea. Viagra is not recommended for people suffering from coronary heart disease, low and high blood pressure, stomach ulcer, and ear disease. (PAP)