Popular culture makes believing a lot of things easy, including that there is a risk of suffering heart attack during sex in our older years.
Research, however, has found that in truth – at least for heart disease patients in the United States – sex is no more risky than going for an upbeat walk.
Furthermore, heart disease patients who have suffered a heart attack are safe to resume sexual activity, if we’re to run on the data published by the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
Researchers involved in the analysis regarded 536 heart disease patients aged between 30-70 to evaluate sexual activity in the year leading up to a heart attack.
They then were able to estimate the link between the frequency of sexual activity and subsequent cardiovascular events, including fatal heart attack, stroke or cardiovascular death.
The report, which was self-reported, indicated that:
– 14.9 per cent of patients reported no sexual activity in the 12 months before their heart attack
– 4.7 per cent reported sex less than once per month
– 25.4 per cent reported less than once per week
– 55 per cent reported one or more times per week
Researchers also evaluated the timing of the last sexual activity before the heart attack.
Only 0.7 per cent reported sex within an hour before their heart attack. In comparison, over 78 per cent reported that their last sexual activity occurred more than 24 hours before the heart attack.
Germany’s Ulm University professor of epidemiology and medical biometry and study author Dr Dietrich Rothenbacher said based on the data, it seems highly unlikely that sexual activity is a relevant heart attack trigger.
“Less than half of men and less than a third of women are getting information about sexual activity after heart attack from their doctors. It is important to reassure patients that they need not be worried and should resume their usual sexual activity,” Dr Dietrich said.
Nevertheless, researchers said that, despite the benefits of sexual activity outweighing risks, the potential of erectile dysfunction as a side effect from various cardiovascular protective medications and the risk of a drop in blood pressure from combining certain heart medications with erectile dysfunction medications should be clearly communicated to patients.
Via Everything Zoomer.
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