Some Pain Meds Tank Testosterone

Men who take Oxycontin and Vicodin for pain relief have a tough question to answer: What hurts more: the pain; or the consequences of low testosterone like muscle loss and reduced sex drive? That’s because researchers at Kaiser Permanente’s Santa Rosa Medical Center have found that men taking long acting opioids for chronic pain were five times more likely to have low testosterone than men taking short-acting opioids. ScienceDaily reports on the study, which compared the use of short-acting opioids, which are taken every four to six hours, and long-acting opioids, which are taken every eight to 12 hours. The researchers found that 74 percent of the men on long-acting opioids had low testosterone levels, compared with 34 percent of the men using short-acting opioids. Read more about it here.