After a few worrisome incidents when your sexual equipment failed you before or during sexual activity, you’ve decided this might be a good time to see how well those widely advertised impotence medications work for you. But you’re not sure which one to pick.
Here’s a suggestion for you. Order a trial pack that includes at least a couple of doses of each of America’s three best-selling ED drugs, namely Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra. That way you can try each to determine which works best for you.
All three of these medications belong to the same family of drugs, known collectively as PDE5 inhibitors. They earn their family name because they all temporarily block the effects of the phosphodiesterase-5 enzyme, which interferes with optimal blood flow to your penis, making it more difficult or impossible to get and keep an erection.
Active Ingredients Vary
Although they all belong to the same family of drugs, each of these popular ED medications has its own unique active ingredient. For Viagra, it’s sildenafil citrate. The active ingredient in Cialis is tadalafil, and for Levitra it’s vardenafil.
As the endings of their names suggest, these active ingredients are fairly similar in chemical structure, but each differs enough from the others that some men who take it may react slightly differently than others do.
It’s entirely possible — even likely — that you’ll get the general sort of results you want from all three of these medications. However, you may find that the side effects from one are more pronounced than those from another one of the drugs.
Give Each Drug a Try
Giving each of these drugs at least a couple of tries also will help to establish how quickly each takes effect, how long it remains effective, and the quality of the erection that each enables you to achieve.
For background purposes, here are a few things that you should know about each of these medications.
VIAGRA
Viagra was the first drug approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of impotence. Its manufacturer, Pfizer Inc., brought the drug to the U.S. market in 1998.
Bright blue in color, Viagra tablets are film-coated and diamond-shaped with rounded corners. Often referred to as the “little blue pill,” Viagra is available in 25-, 50-, and 100-milligram tablets. Doctors usually start patients with a 50-milligram tablet and then if necessary lower or increase the dose based on how well the initial dose works.
Most prescriptions call for Viagra to be taken one hour before sexual activity, although some Viagra users report that the drug usually takes effect for them in 30 to 40 minutes. Duration of action ranges from four to five hours.
Viagra can be taken with or without food, although when it’s taken with food the onset of action may be slightly delayed. No more than one Viagra tablet should be taken in a 24-hour period.
No Spontaneous Erections
If you’re new to ED drugs, you should be aware that Viagra — or any of the other impotence medications on the market — will not cause a spontaneous erection. It simply creates the optimal physiological conditions in your body so that it’s possible to achieve and maintain an erection the good, old-fashioned way. That means that it will take feelings of sexual desire or physical stimulation to trigger the erection process.
Viagra’s side effects are generally mild and tend to disappear altogether with continued use. The pill’s most common side effects include headache, flushing, indigestion, runny or stuffy nose, and dizziness. Among the pill’s more serious side effects are temporary loss of vision or hearing or an erection that lasts for four hours or more. Although these more serious side effects are rare, anyone who experiences them should consult a medical professional immediately.
Don’t Mix with Nitrates
Viagra and all the rest of the PDE5 inhibitors cause a temporary drop in blood pressure as they divert blood flow to the penis. Because of this blood pressure-lowering effect, none of these medications should be taken concurrently with nitrate-based drugs, such as nitroglycerin, widely prescribed to treat angina. Taken together, they could cause a life-threatening drop in blood pressure.
LEVITRA
Levitra, the second ED drug to hit the U.S. market, got the nod from the FDA in August 2003. The drug is marketed as round, film-coated tablets that are orange in color. The drug is available in 2.5-, 5-, 10-, and 20-milligram tablets. The standard starting dosage is 10 milligrams, which can be either lowered or increased based on the patient’s reaction to the initial dose level. You should never take more than one tablet of Levitra in any 24-hour period.
When to Take Levitra
Levitra can be taken 30 to 60 minutes before sexual activity. You can take the drug with or without food, although some patients report that taking the drug with a high-fat meal tends to reduce its effectiveness. Like Viagra, Levitra’s duration of action ranges from four to five hours.
Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals manufactures Levitra, which is distributed in the United States by GlaxoSmithKline.
The side effects of Levitra tend to be mild and disappear with continued use. In descending order of the percentage of patients reporting these adverse effects, they include headache, reported by 15 percent of patients; flushing, 11 percent; runny or stuffy nose, 9 percent; indigestion, 4 percent; flu syndrome, 3 percent; and dizziness, 2 percent.
As with Viagra, Levitra should never be taken concurrently with nitrate-based drugs because together these medications can cause a precipitous and potentially dangerous drop in blood pressure.
CIALIS
Cialis, approved by the FDA in November 2003, was the third impotence drug introduced on the U.S. market. Manufactured and distributed by Eli Lilly and Company, Cialis sets itself apart from Viagra and Levitra because it has a much longer duration of action — up to 36 hours. Cialis is also available in a pill for daily use, which must be taken once daily in order to allow the user to be ready for sexual activity whenever the time is right. This latter formulation of Cialis is not included in the trial pack of the three medications.
Cialis tablets are almond-shaped and yellow in color. They are available in 2.5-, 5-, 10-, and 20-milligram tablets. The standard starting dose for longer-lasting duration of action is 10 milligrams, which can be adjusted upward or downward depending on how the patient reacts to the initial dose.
Because of its longer-lasting effectiveness, Cialis for Use as Needed has earned the nickname of the “weekend pill.” In fact, a Cialis tablet taken at 9 p.m. on a Friday night can usually be expected to remain effective until roughly 9 a.m. on Sunday.
Side Effects
Common side effects from Cialis are usually mild and tend to disappear after you’ve been on the drug for a while. In order of percentage of incidence among patients in clinical trials, side effects from 20-milligram Cialis include headache, reported by 15 percent; indigestion, 10 percent; back pain, 6 percent; muscle pain, 3 percent; nasal congestion, 3 percent; and flushing, 3 percent.
If you’d like to purchase a trial pack of these three ED drugs, eDrugstore.com offers trial packs of varying size, starting with one that combines two 100-milligram Viagra tablets, two 20-milligram Cialis tablets, and two 20-milligram Levitra tablets. The price for this trial package is $283.
Because the sample pack includes the highest dosage of each medication, you can split the pills to see if a lower dose produces the desired results for you. If it does, the six-tablet trial package provides you with a total of 12 doses.
Only FDA-Approved Drugs
Part of the Secure Medical network of online drug stores, eDrugstore is based in Tempe, Arizona. It sells only FDA-approved medications that are sourced solely from state-licensed pharmacies in the United States.
To place an order for the trial pack, you will need a doctor’s prescription. If you already have one from your physician, you can fax or scan and email it to eDrugstore along with your order. If you don’t have a prescription, eDrugstore can set up an online consultation with one of its team of contracted physicians. You’ll be required to fill out a questionnaire covering your medical history and current symptoms. One of the team physicians will review your questionnaire and write a prescription if he or she deems it appropriate.
Don Amerman is a freelance author who writes extensively about a wide array of nutrition and health-related topics.
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