The last thing we need is yet another erection pill with the same risks as the old ones — but that’s just what the FDA is giving us.

It’s called Stendra, but don’t bother remembering the name. You’ll be hearing it in commercials soon enough now that the feds have signed off on it.

Like Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra, the new med is a PDE5 inhibitor. The only real difference is that this new drug promises to work faster than the old ones — supposedly getting things going in as little as 15 minutes, compared to an hour or more for the drugs already on the market.

That might sound great — but the side effects of PDE5 inhibitors are decidedly UN-sexy.

They can cause headaches, forcing you to say “not now” just when you’re ready. They can also give you back pain, which will really limit your bedroom activities, and even cause cold-like symptoms.

Not exactly Harlequin romance material.

These drugs have even caused men to go blind and deaf, which would really make it a challenge to use that drug-induced erection. And by the way, the famous “four-hour erections” mentioned in the commercials for these meds is a dangerous condition where blood can’t leave the penis.

It’s called priapism — and it requires an immediate trip to the emergency room, where the fastest way to relieve that pressure is to drain the blood with a needle, apply an ice pack, or inject a medication.

Ouch!

But forget all the side effects (if you can — I’m not sure it’s possible to forget that last one). There’s another reason to skip the meds when it comes to sexual health, and that’s because the problems themselves are almost always a sign of another problem in the body.

For example, the most common cause of erectile dysfunction is atherosclerosis. That’s when your arteries get stiff from too much plaque — and when your arteries get stiff, you can’t get stiff in other places.

Since atherosclerosis is also the leading cause of heart attacks, stroke, and more, it’s something that needs to be fixed urgently. But if your only warning is erectile dysfunction and you can “fix” it with a sex med, you can ignore it… until the day your wife has to call the ambulance.

In other cases, erection problems are caused by diabetes, poor nutrition, hormonal imbalances (especially low testosterone levels), stress, and even many prescription medications.

A holistic doctor can help find the real cause of erection problems and correct it without the drugs or the risks.

Your doc might think a CT angiogram is a great way to peek into your arteries to determine what kind of heart risks you might be facing.

Sure, it’s great for him — it helps him pay his bills.

But for you, it’s not so great — especially if you don’t have any heart symptoms. Not only are these scans useless when it comes to saving lives or preventing heart problems in healthy patients, but they also lead to more tests, drug prescriptions, and even invasive catheters.

Researchers compared 1,000 Korean angiogram patients with no history of chest pain to 1,000 similar patients who got only a standard medical exam without a CT screening.

More than 20 percent of the scan patients learned they had the signs of atherosclerosis. One third of them ended up on cholesterol-lowering statin drugs, and 40 percent ended up on the dangerous aspirin-a-day routine.

By comparison, only 10 percent of patients with “normal” scans and 10 percent of those who weren’t scanned at all were put on those meds.

After 90 days, however, there was absolutely no difference in the rate of serious heart problems in either group, according to the study in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

Eighteen months later, it still made no difference at all. Just one patient in each group experienced any kind of serious heart problem in that time.

There were a lot of numbers in there, so let me break it down for you. These screenings don’t save lives. But they could help ruin more than a few — because the treatments and even the test itself come with big risks.

CT angiograms deliver up to 600 times the radiation of a single x-ray. At a time when we should be cutting down on exposure, these things give you more.

Patients who get them are also injected with a special contrasting dye that can lead to allergic reactions and even kidney damage.

But wait, there’s more! If your unnecessary angiogram leads to a statin prescription, you could face everything from muscle pain to sexual side effects.

And patients who gobble down aspirin for their heart can literally ruin their stomach.

I’m not sure why docs keep telling patients to swallow aspirin for heart health in the first place — studies have repeatedly found that so-called aspirin therapy is a myth.

Read more about that here.

Bottom line: If you’re not experiencing heart problems, think twice before you get scanned.

by Dr. Alan Inglis

If the latest research is any indication, your next doctor visit should include a prescription for tomatoes.

A study has found that lycopene, an antioxidant, can cut the building up of plaque that leads to atherosclerosis. Lycopene is found in all of the healthy red-tinged fruits and vegetables. They include tomatoes, red peppers and red grapefruit.

The researchers divided animals into several groups and gave them varied diets. Two of the groups were given high-fat diets, with one group receiving a lycopene supplement and the other a statin.

Lycopene supplements were found to be superior to statins. The group that received the lycopene showed lower blood serum levels of total and LDL cholesterol.

This could be yet another reason why those who eat a Mediterranean diet stay so heart- healthy-it’s all of those recipes that include tomatoes.

So the next time your doctor takes a look at your cholesterol (you know it’s inevitable) and pushes a prescription for a statin your way, push back. Tell him about this finding and let him know you’re going to redden your plate for a natural way to manage your cholesterol.