- The stick-on skin patch could be worn on the upper arm or abdomen
- Could also curb side-effects triggered by ingesting the drug
- These include headaches, indigestion, disturbed vision and muscle pain
- Unlike pill, could work in minutes and beyond current 10-hour window
Pat Hagan for MailOnline
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Viagra has transformed the love lives of millions of men over the last 20 years.
But is the famous little blue pill soon to be overtaken by a simple-to-use stick-on patch?
Scientists have developed a way to get the libido-boosting drug through the skin rather than the mouth.
It could slash the time it takes to work from up to an hour to a matter of minutes and increase the length of time it is effective for beyond the current ten hours.
The patch, which could be worn on the upper arm or abdomen, could also curb side-effects triggered by ingesting the drug, such as headaches and migraines, indigestion, disturbed vision and muscle pain.
Scientists have developed a way to deliver Viagra through the skin rather than taking a pill
Latest tests show it is possible to shrink sildenafil citrate, the drug used to make Viagra, down into tiny nanoparticles small enough to penetrate the skin and get into the bloodstream.
An estimated 1.5m men a year in the UK currently get Viagra on the NHS.
It has helped to transform the treatment of impotence – or erectile dysfunction – and restored the sex lives of countless couples.
But the 25mg pill usually has to be taken at least 30 minutes to an hour before sexual activity.
More recent drugs in the same class, such as Cialis, trigger erections more rapidly but still carry the risk of side-effects.
And for around one in three men, Viagra has no effect.
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Their only other options are to inject drugs straight into the penis, or use a pump that manually increases blood supply to the organ.
Neither is very popular. Scientists have been trying for years to develop new ways to get drugs like Viagra into the blood without going via the stomach – in order to reduce the risk of adverse effects.
Previous attempts have been hindered by the fact that most pharmaceutical medicines are made up of relatively large molecules that are unable to fully penetrate the skin.
But at team at King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, along with scientists at Cairo University, have made a breakthrough which could see Viagra patches available in a few years’ time.
They used a new drug delivery method, called transferome technology, to make a tiny patch just 1cm squared.
Each patch is made of a thin film containing minute particles of the active drug, which are coated in a thin layer of fat to help with absorption through the skin.
The new skin patch could slash the time it takes to work from up to an hour to a matter of minutes and increase the length of time it is effective for beyond the current ten hours
The experimental patch was tested on rats to see how much of the medicine seeped through. It contained just one milligramme of Viagra, so human patches will need to be bigger to accommodate the 25mg to 50mg standard dose.
Also in the patch is a chemical that improves penetration of the skin.
In a report in the journal Drug Design, Development and Therapy, scientists said the results showed Viagra particles successfully passed through the outer and inner layers of the skin.
In a report on the findings they said: ‘This could be a promising delivery system for the drug.
‘The skin is an alternative route to the oral one, prolonging the effect and reducing variability.’
Dr Geoff Hackett, chairman of the British Society of Sexual Medicine, said a patch could be popular with some men who might find it easier to use but warned it could prove to be an expensive option when the tablets only cost around 30 pence each.
He said: ‘In theory, a patch might be a nice way of delivering the drug in the long-term.
‘But I cannot really see how a patch which is likely to cost around £10 is going to replace a pill that is a fraction of the price.’
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