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'Hypertension may lower libido in women'
Women with high blood pressure may suffer from decreased sexual desire compared to women with normal blood pressure, says a study.
Women with high blood pressure may suffer from decreased sexual desire compared to women with normal blood pressure, says a study.
Michael Doumas and other researchers at the University of Athens evaluated more than 400 women at an outpatient clinic in Greece.
They found that female sexual dysfunction (FSD) is more prevalent in women with hypertension, the medical term for high blood pressure, compared to those with normal blood pressure.
The researchers who presented their study recently at the 21st Annual Meeting of the American Society of Hypertension in New York City also said that the age and duration of hypertension appear to be significant predictors of FSD, according to Newswise wire.
They found that sexual dysfunction rates gradually increased in older versus younger women with high blood pressure and the longer a woman had hypertension the more likely she was to experience sexual dysfunction.
A blood pressure that is consistently (more than six months) above 140/90 is considered as high blood pressure.
"These findings are significant because although hypertension affects more than 20 percent of the general population, and is a known risk factor for male sexual dysfunction, there is no definite data on a relation between sexual dysfunction and hypertension in women," said Doumas.
