Viagra may ease Crohn’s disease

A new theory about the causes of Crohn’s disease suggests that Viagra could be used to relieve symptoms.

Researchers from University College London suggest that Crohn’s disease may be caused by a failure of the immune response. Previously, scientists thought that Crohn’s disease was caused by excess inflammation.

Crohn’s disease is a chronic inflammatory disorder of the bowel which causes severe gastrointestinal symptoms and often leads to chronic ill health.

The study, published in the Lancet, suggests that patients could be prescribed Viagra to boost blood flow to an infected site, thus improving the body’s inflammatory response to infection.

Led by Professor Tony Segal the team compared the immune response to injuries of Crohn’s disease sufferers and a control group of healthy patients. They found that those suffering from the disease produced far fewer infection-fighting white blood cells and had a much lower blood flow over the injured areas.

They then used Viagra to correct the blood flow to normal levels, hence the possibility it could be used in treatment.

Professor Segal said that he believes that in Crohn’s an injury to the bowel fails to kick-start the immune response needed to remove the bacteria and return the bowel to normal.

“Inflammation in our healthy volunteers was associated with the production of nitric oxide, a similar mechanism to that which induces the penis to become erect,” Professor Segal said.

“We therefore used Viagra to correct the poor response in Crohn’s sufferers, where the drug amplified the effects of nitric oxide to return inflammation levels to nearly normal.”

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