NEWS:Viagra Treats Enlarged Hearts other Than Erectile Dysfunction

AM Source : Health News ExpressNewsline.com

Viagra is not just meant to restore male sexual powers, it can also be used to treat enlarged hearts. Enlarged Heart with viagra could be possible according to a new research done in treating enlarged hearts in laboratory mice.

Viagra scientifically known as sildenafil citrate was good in treatment of enlargement and thickening of the heart in male mice. Viagra was also effective in controlling the further growth of the heart muscle. Sildenafil has shown positive results as it reversed the growth and damage that had already taken place in the heart.

Dr. Richard Stein, a national spokesman for the American Heart Association said that whatever works on mice, can be applied to humans also, but the trials on human subjects are expected to kick off later this year.

Dr. Hunter Champion, an assistant professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine was co-author in the study published on 23 Jan. He was positive on the results they got in treating mice Viagra. Humans will get the similar doses and hopes are strong in treating heart ailments.

Enlargment and thickening of the heart muscles also known as hypertrophy can be blocked effectively using Viagra.

High blood pressure can lead to cardiac hypertrophy, a thickening of the heart muscle brought on because the heart has to pump harder to get its job done. At least one fourth of people with high blood pressure have cardiac hypertrophy, which also increases the risk of heart failure or sudden death.

In an experiment, the researchers gave Viagra to a group of male mice that had already developed hypertrophy. After two weeks, fibrosis and muscle growth almost completely disappeared in the mice given Viagra while hearts continued to grow in the control mice.

Viagra works, both in the heart and the penis, by inhibiting an enzyme called PDE5A.

In the penis, however, PDE5A relaxes the smooth muscle, allowing the blood to flow and nature to resume its course.

By contrast, in the heart muscle, rather than producing a direct relaxation response, PDE5A helps break down cyclic GMP, a molecule that acts to curb stresses and overgrowth in the heart.

Experts had not previously known that PDE5A was involved in heart function. They had also suspected that excessive heart muscle growth was an adaptive response to malfunction in the heart.

Viagra was originally developed to dilate coronary blood vessels in people with angina. It didn't work well for angina pain but was revealed to have the erectile dysfunction effect and became a medicine for re-gaining sexual powers.

Researchers will also be looking to see if Viagra has any effect on other systems in the body.

Viagra is widely used to treat erectile dysfunction. The makers of Viagra were not involved in the new study and it was an independent study. The work was funded by the National Institutes of Health and the American Heart Association

The Johns Hopkins study is published in the Jan. 23 online edition of the journal Nature Medicine.