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Some specialists call it the last taboo since the start of the Viagra era. Even with public talk of impotence now commonplace, that new openness does not stop the cringes at the mention of an even more common male sexual problem: premature ejaculation.
But that may be about to change. With promising pills for the condition on the horizon, drug-company money is helping support an array of research on premature ejaculation.
Sexual-medicine specialists, who estimate that 20 to 30 percent of men of all ages have the condition, are working on defining it in a scientifically more rigorous way, refining existing treatments such as the use of antidepressants, and testing the new drugs.
''The new wave of research is not just about drug development," said Stanley Althof, a psychology professor at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. ''It's also about trying to understand what's at the basis of these problems and develop new and better treatments."
It will be months before the US Food and Drug Administration is expected to decide on approval for the farthest along of the drugs, a Johnson and Johnson compound called dapoxetine that is similar to antidepressants such as Prozac -- which often cause delays in orgasm. But the new drug acts faster and its effects fade much more quickly. Pfizer, too, is working on a pill, as are several other, smaller companies, researchers say.
Major questions remain: Will dapoxetine and the other drugs be approved? If so, how popular will they be, given that studies show that premature ejaculation generally bothers men much less than impotence does?
Still, some specialists foresee a not-so-distant time when premature ejaculation becomes part of public discourse, much as erectile dysfunction did when Viagra came along in the late 1990s, accompanied by ads with prominent patients such as Bob Dole and an influx of men into doctors' offices to request the little blue pill.
In the most recent sign of expanding research on premature ejaculation, this month's Journal of Sexual Medicine describes a study in which hundreds of wives used stopwatches to time their husbands in bed. The study, the largest of its kind, aimed to define the boundary between normal and premature ejaculation.
http://www.boston.com/news/science/articles/2005/05/08/after_viagra_tackling_another_sexual_taboo/
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