"Ed Pawlowski" wrote in
:


"Lew Hodgett" wrote

A rather limited part of the medical community specializes in
treating the problem thus conventional means of
drug_manufacturer/doctor communication already exists.

Substitute a few other of the high profit, recreational like drugs
such as Viagra, if that works better for you.

Lew

Viagra was not invented as a recreational drug or for ED. It was
undergoing clinical testing for angina relief but it did not work very
well for that. When the men in the trial did not want to stop the
drug, it was discovered that they liked the side effects.

But they were definitely thinking about it. At a conference in
Philadelphia on nitric oxide* Louis Ignarro answered a question about
using a cream with an NO donor substance to enhance erections as follows:
Sounds like a bad idea, because the partner might faint due to lowering
of blood pressure when the substance would enter her system. I remember
the laughs.

NO (nitirc oxide) stimulates an enzyme called guanylate cyclase that
generates cGMP, which is responsible for vasodilation. Nitroglycerin is
an NO donor that also causes vasodilation via cGMP generation, but it
works best for the heart.
Viagra etc are inhibitors of one of the enzymes that degrade cGMP. There
is some tissue specificity in the diverse cyclic GMP phosphodiesterases
(PDEs), so Viagra etc work better for the purposes they are now marketed
for.

At the time (late 80s, early 90s), there was great interest in
commercializing the NO research. Louis Ignarro got the Nobel prize with
Robert F. Furchgott and Ferid Murad for their NO-related research.
Furchgott discovered an "endothelium-derived relaxing factor" which
turned out to be NO. Murad was involved in the cGMP research for Abbott
Labs.

--
Best regards
Han
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