A Case of Male Impotency

Presenting Complaint: Erectile Dysfunction

First Consultation: 8^th July 2013

Observations: Overweight – strange mark under eyes and across cheeks.

A 49 year old male came to me for treatment for erectile dysfunction. In addition to this, he suffered from sleep apnoea (marks on face were from night time use of oxygen through face mask), and he was taking Enalapril for high blood pressure.

His erectile dysfunction had started 4 years previously. He first realised that he needed more and more stimulation to achieve an erection and then after a while, even if he was able to achieve erection he found that it didn’t last for long and he couldn’t ejaculate. This had begun during a stressful time in his life – money worries, starting up a new business.  “Everything had been ok before then”.

He told me that he had got in touch with me because Relate (relationship counselling) had told him that his problem wasn’t psychological because he wasn’t getting morning erections and he couldn’t get an erection when masturbating.  When asked if he had discussed this issue with his GP he told me that when he went to the GP recently, it took a long time to sort out the sleep apnoea and there wasn’t enough time to talk to the GP about anything else.

He was easily exhausted, which he thought was a result of being overweight and having sleep apnoea and he felt worse in hot weather – “completely wrung out”.   He had difficulty concentrating and often felt overwhelmingly tired at work.   He felt quite depressed and described himself as “anti-social”, often irritated when people were talking to him.  He still got occasional headaches – always in the afternoon when he was tired.

Enquiry about childhood, general health, and emotional wellbeing led to the following information:

 

• ·        Shy child – used to keep his hood up all the time to hide away
• ·        Bullied at school
• ·        Not close as a family – his parents had both had difficult childhoods and had clung to each other for comfort, excluding him and his brother. 
• ·        Took responsibility for his brother as a child
• ·        Married for 25 years (still married)
• ·        Working as sales manager
• ·        Money worries – felt responsible for wife – pressure to provide
• ·        Started to gain weight in mid 20’s
• ·        Fairly healthy until 40’s, then started having headaches, diagnosed with high blood pressure and sleep apnoea and was drinking alcohol in excess on daily basis.
• ·        Hx diabetes and heart disease in family – told by GP that he was pre-diabetic.

 

In the past month he had reduced alcohol intake (down to one or two beers at weekend), cut back on fast/junk food and joined a gym. 

 

Symptom Choice:

Exhaustion < heat

Lack of concentration

Erectile dysfunction

Breathing obstructed during sleep

Excessive alcohol use

 

Rubrics: (ISIS)

HEAT, EXHAUSTION (6)

CONCENTRATION, general; difficult (264)

IMPOTENCY, sexual (192)

IMPEDED, breathing, obstructed; night (4)

ALCOHOL, general; abuse, poisonings (129)

 

 

I had not used Selenium as a remedy before, so went directly to this remedy in my Murphy’s Remedy Guide to learn more about it.  Here I found the following:

 

HOMEOPATHIC

• Marked effects on the genito-urinary organs, especially men.
• Easy exhaustion
• Great debility – worse heat
• Easy exhaustion, mental and physical

 

CLINICAL

• Alcoholism
• Diabetes
• Headache
• Impotence

 

MODALITIES

• Worse loss of sleep
• Worse by mental exertion
• Worse in hot weather
• Worse every afternoon (headaches)

 

MIND

• Extreme sadness
• Dread of society
• Difficulty in concentration
• Irritated by noise, people and conversation

 

FOOD

• Desire for alcoholic drinks

 

HEAD

• Headache from intellectual labour

 

LUNGS

• Respiration obstructed at night, when lying down

 

MALE

• Loss of sexual power
• On attempting sex, penis relaxes

 

COMMENTS

• A leading feature of Selenium is the weakness it causes, a weakness involving all parts of the body and easy fatigue from any labor, night watching, mental exertion and especially hot weather.

 

Ref:  Murphy R (2000), Homeopathic Remedy Guide.  Virginia USA: H.A.N.A Press.

 

Px:  Selenium 30c 3 x weekly for 4 weeks.

 

2^nd Consultation: 5^th August 2013

The patient reported that he had had an erection within 3 days of starting his homeopathic remedy.  He was losing weight and “lots of things are back on line”.

He had taken the first pill at lunchtime – no erection and he felt sexually frustrated.  On day 2 he had attempted to masturbate.  He managed a slight erection but was unable to ejaculate.  On day 4 he had managed a full erection and full ejaculation.  By day 17 he was “having inappropriate erections” at work and decided not to take any more pills.  He felt that his erections were now within normal control and were “on demand”.

He had noticed that he now had a slight ache in his left test-icle and had noticed slight marks at the base of his testicles. I suggested that a physical examination by his GP would be a sensible way forward if this continued and was cause for concern.

He said that there was a slight improvement with the sleep apnoea. He said he had great energy and was really enjoying his regular sessions at the gym.

I invited him to call me if he needed further support for any remaining or returning health concerns.     Px: None