Researchers are looking more closely at a possible link between the use of erectile dysfunction drugs and the risk of melanoma. They find that it’s not the ED drug that’s responsible for a higher incidence of the skin cancer but the more affluent lifestyle of men who can regularly afford to take ED medications.
After a research paper released in 2014 hinted at a link between Viagra and melanoma, a team of researchers delved into data to try to determine if there was a correlation.
Led by urologist Stacy Loeb, M.D., of New York University, the researchers reviewed the medical records of 20,235 men in Sweden. Of them, 4,065 were diagnosed with malignant melanoma between 2006 and 2012, and 435 of them had taken Viagra, Cialis, or Levitra.
The team found that men who filled at least one prescription for an erectile dysfunction drug had a 21 percent greater risk of malignant melanoma than men who didn’t fill any prescriptions for ED drugs. But why?
To the untrained eye, that number might seem high enough to lead one to jump to the conclusion of cause and effect, but as Loeb said in an interview with Forbes, “Many times you’ll see an association — two things that may track together — but not because one actually causes the other. There are criteria that can help determine if X causes Y.”
Ruling Out Cause and Effect
To prove that Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra didn’t cause melanoma, Loeb and her team checked for other correlations and found that:
- Among men who filled more than six prescriptions for ED drugs, they found no elevated risk of melanoma.
- Men who had taken Cialis, the ED drug with the longest half-life, showed no greater melanoma risk.
- There were no advanced cases of skin cancer among men using ED drugs.
Accounting for Melanoma
So what WAS causing the melanoma in men taking ED drugs like Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra?
According to Loeb, men who get melanoma tend to be able to afford not only ED drugs, but also expensive vacations in sunny climates where the exposure to damaging rays is high.
The moral of the story? Don’t stop taking ED drugs — or putting on sunscreen!
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