High Cholesterol

Why You Should Tell Your Family Medicine Provider About Erectile Dysfunction

Erectile dysfunction can impact various aspects of your life, especially on your relationship. But more than the impacts, it may also indicate a serious medical condition. Therefore, even if you feel self-conscious and don’t want to speak with a medical professional, you should muster up the courage to visit a practitioner who specializes in erectile dysfunction Royal Palm Beach or erectile dysfunction Wellington.

Emotional Well-Being

Erectile dysfunction, also known as ED, can cause a great deal of worry. You’ll start wondering if you’ll be able to fully regain sexual function.

It will make you feel fearful of sexual encounters with your partner. In some cases, it may cause you to have low self-esteem and make you feel overly self-conscious.

These negative feelings can affect your future sexual endeavors since psychological factors can inhibit your ability to achieve and maintain an erection.

Impact on Your Relationship

Even if your partner wouldn’t mention it, he or she may feel neglected. It’s also possible that your partner will feel that you find her/him undesirable. He or she may also feel like the problem stems from something he or she did or didn’t do.

High Blood Pressure

High blood pressure (hypertension) is known as a silent killer because it doesn’t always cause symptoms. However, your erectile dysfunction could be a sign that your blood is forcefully pushing against your arterial walls.

This condition can damage your heart and blood vessels when left untreated. It also increases your risk of a heart attack or stroke.

The reason hypertension causes ED is because it reduces blood flow in some men, which makes it more difficult to achieve an erection. Sometimes, high blood pressure will decrease your sexual desires and hinder your ability to ejaculate.

A Sign of Have Heart Disease

Heart disease is a generalized term that describes conditions that affect your heart and blood vessels, such as coronary artery disease. Conditions that affect your heart’s rhythm also classify as heart disease. When left untreated, you can have a heart attack or stroke from these conditions.

While you may experience symptoms like chest fluttering, shortness of breath, and chest pain, ED can be a sign as well. It causes ED because it limits blood flow to your penis. Research indicates a link between heart disease and damage to blood vessel’s interlining and the smooth muscle, which affects the blood supply to your heart and ultimately to your penis.

Complication from Diabetes

Diabetes is a condition when your blood sugar levels are too high. When you have diabetes, you may feel frequently tired, develop skin problems, and experience excessive hunger.

When you don’t receive diabetes treatment, the uncontrolled high glucose levels can damage your heart and kidneys. Your risk for a stroke or heart attack increases as well.

Diabetes can damage your nerves and blood vessels when not well manage, thus interfering with your ability to obtain and maintain an erection.

High Cholesterol

High cholesterol flows through your blood. It has a waxy texture and can build up in your blood and hinder the ability of your blood to flow normally. Unfortunately, it may cause a heart attack or stroke.

With this condition, you won’t know you have it because it doesn’t cause any symptoms. Therefore, the only sign you may have is erectile dysfunction.

High cholesterol causes erectile dysfunction because it can cause atherosclerosis – a narrowing of your blood vessels. As a result, blood can’t flow to your penis properly.

Why Visit a Wellington Family Practice for ED Treatment

Even if you’ve learned to live with your erectile dysfunction, you should still visit a family practitioner in Wellington or Royal Palm Beach. Not only does it affect your life and mental health, but you might also have ED as a sign of an underlying condition.

At Advanced Medical Clinic, our practitioners recognize the dangers of erectile dysfunction. Each one of us listens with an open, non-judgmental ear and finds a solution for you. We also take the time to assess you for underlying health conditions.

Book an appointment with Advanced Medical Clinic, serving Royal Palm Beach, Wellington, and the surrounding Florida area, for erectile dysfunction treatment and an assessment for any possible conditions that are contributing to the problem. Call us at (561) 434-1935 or use our online form.

Does My Weight Increase the Risk for Heart Disease?

As modern and advanced as we think the United States is, it may still come as a surprise to some that obesity is a very real and present epidemic. In fact, 35 percent of adults and 17 percent of children and adolescents are considered overweight to the point of being obese. And this number continues to grow! Body Mass Index (BMI) is a measurement of how much body fat someone has, determined by looking at their weight and height. If your BMI is over 35, then you are considered obese. This epidemic is severe, and it is important for people to know that being obese poses a detrimental threat to their overall health. Many people who are obese also exhibit risk factors such as high blood pressure (hypertension), high cholesterol, and conditions such as diabetes, obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), stroke, and the number one cause of death – cardiovascular disease, also known as heart disease.

Heart disease is the number one cause of death around the world. Some of the most common forms are coronary heart disease (coronary artery disease), arrhythmia (abnormal heart beat), and congenital heart disease. So, does increased body weight contribute to an increased risk for heart disease?

Research has shown that being obese has been directly linked to heart failure and increased mortality rate, as a result of its correlation with the various types of heart diseases. Due to a decrease in blood flow to the heart muscle, the heart cannot pump blood as efficiently and effectively as it should.

So, to answer the question – yes, your weight does increase the risk for heart failure due to cardiovascular diseases. There are several ways obesity and cardiovascular disease are related, depending on the particular disease and the severity of how overweight or obese someone is. Coronary artery disease (CAD), where the arteries of the heart and its blood flow become blocked due to plaque build-up, is the leading cause of myocardial infarction, resulting in chest pain (angina), and possible death if left untreated.

After accounting for the risk factors generally associated with heart disease and obesity, such as high blood pressure, diabetes, and high cholesterol, a study done in the Journal of the American Heart Association investigated the role of severe obesity and the development of heart conditions such as coronary heart disease, stroke and heart failure. While obesity has been a known risk factor for developing heart disease, results showed that severe obesity is in fact, its own independent risk factor for heart failure.

A team at John Hopkins University conducted a study with participants who were morbidly obese, and were found to be twice as likely to develop heart failure, comparable to the people with a healthy body mass index, and not considered obese. Obesity is an independent risk factor for heart failure. Someone with a BMI over 35 and diagnosed as obese is at risk for getting some form of heart disease. This study proved that these people who were morbidly obese were more likely than those of normal weight to have a stroke or coronary heart disease. Yes, obesity alone leaves a person at a significantly higher risk for heart failure, whether or not they have hypertension or diabetes. Even if patients have normal blood pressure and cholesterol levels, they are still at risk for heart failure if they are obese or overweight.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says almost six million people in the United States live with heart failure, so family medicine providers have noticed that there needs to be an improvement in educating patients, and people in general of the risk factors, and ways to keep their heart healthy, in order to better help prevent heart failure, and decrease the number of deaths. This includes eating a heart healthy diet, and making an effort to have regular exercise or activity.

Well, research studies are one thing, and real life is another. If you are overweight, you generally know that there is a healthier you that you can attain to be. You should also know that it’s important to speak with your healthcare professional about whether you might be more at risk for heart disease. To learn more about how your weight can be an indicator that you are at risk for heart disease, call Advanced Medical at (561) 434-1935, or you can request an appointment online.