Bromocriptine not just for Parkinson’s disease
In view of the enormous marketing success of Viagra, many pharmaceutical companies may be tempted to distribute substances that could be proven to enhance sexual response. However, for old drugs, the patents of which have expired, there is little incentive to invest in the necessary clinical trials.
The sexually enhancing effect of bromocriptine is very different from the effect of phosphodiesterase inhibitors. Phosphodiesterase inhibitors work primarily on the sexual organ, chemically providing better rigidity, or some rigidity in the first place.
Bromocriptine, on the other hand, primarily works on the brain, making a person more receptive to sexual stimulation and creating a frame of mind for more powerful orgasms. Both effects are a logical consequence of the way bromocriptine is traditionally used to lower levels of the hormone prolactin, and to stimulate dopamine receptors.
High levels of prolactin are generally associated with a decreased sex drive. So, by lowering levels of prolactin, especially when they are high, bromocriptine is regularly credited with increasing the interest in sex.
A similar effect is achieved by bromocriptine through the neurological route. Bromocriptine is used as a medication in Parkinson’s disease because it stimulates dopamine receptors. Parkinson’s disease is a condition caused by dopamine levels that are too low. Low dopamine levels normally also cause a loss of interest in sex, and an increased sex drive is a common “side effect” of many Parkinson’s medications. But one person’s side effect is another person’s cure.
While the increase in sex drive caused by bromocriptine may be hard to measure, the effect on orgasms is more obvious. A considerable number of people who have tried bromocriptine have reported that orgasms become more powerful, ironically because orgasms are better controlled. There may be several near-orgasms before the real orgasm happens, and the real orgasm may be accompanied by a histamine reaction, which is more clearly felt (stuffy nose).
Bromocriptine is a prescription drug almost everywhere, though in many countries of the world, prescription drugs can be bought over the counter. In countries where prescription drugs are indeed only sold on prescription, it is within a physician’s discretion to prescribe a drug for conditions for which it has not originally been approved.
For a substance to be approved as a medication, an illness has first to be defined for which it is a cure. Nowadays, there are many newly defined illnesses, such as clinical depression, attention deficit disorder, and erectile dysfunction, which have previously not been considered illnesses but just part of the individuality of a particular human being.
Some members of the species are smarter than others, and some are happier, and some of the males are more virile than their neighbours. Not to be as smart as a genius, and not to be as virile as one’s neighbour aren’t diseases in the classical sense. But new illnesses are constantly defined, primarily when the pharmaceutical industry has on hand a medication to overcome the condition.
So, if there will soon be a medical condition named Weak Orgasm Syndrome, or Clinical Sex Drive Loss, bromocriptine is a sure medication candidate among probable new entries to the market that are sold at ten or twenty times the price.