FRIDAY, July 4 (HealthDay News) -- Incidence of erectile dysfunction among men aged 55 to 75 years is correlated with the frequency of intercourse, and regular sex reduces the risk of impotence, according to research published in the July issue of The American Journal of Medicine.
Juha Koskimaki, M.D., Ph.D., of Tampere University Hospital in Tampere, Finland, and colleagues analyzed data on 989 men aged 55 to 75 years who participated in a population-based five-year follow-up study based on postal questionnaires and conducted in Finland. Men with erectile dysfunction at baseline were excluded from the analysis, and the data provided included coital frequency.
There were 32 cases of erectile dysfunction per 1,000 person-years, and men who reported intercourse less than once a week had twice the incidence of erectile dysfunction of those who reported having sex once a week, and four times that of those who reported intercourse three times or more a week, once comorbidities and other risk factors had been taken into account.
"A crucial issue is whether coital frequency is actually a determinant of the development of erectile dysfunction or merely a risk indicator," the authors write. "We assessed the frequency of intercourse before the occurrence of erectile dysfunction and adjusted for the other major risk factors. Therefore, our results provide strong support for a causal role of coital frequency."
Abstract
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