Viagra 'improves jet lag'
Tuesday, 22 May 2007 10:51
Frequent flyers could benefit
Moderate doses of Viagra could help frequent flyers and shift workers recover more quickly to their normal daily routine, new research has found.
As well as aiding recovery, a dose of the drug, also known as sildenafil, could help to reduce medical problems associated with jet lag and shift work.
Argentine researchers base their claims, made in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal today, on a study conducted on hamsters and Viagra.
They gave the rodent a small dose of the drug at night before turning on bright lights six hours earlier than they usually woke up. How quickly they adjusted to the change was gauged by when they started exercising on their wheels.
Sildenafil-boosted hamsters recovered from the jet lag 25 to 50 per cent more quickly than rodents without the drug.
This effect is thought to be due to Viagra's ability to interfere with the enzyme that reduces the compound cGMP, which has an important function in the brain of regulating the body's daily clock – known as the circadian cycle.
But although Viagra had a positive effect, the researchers found that this only occurred when applied before an advance in the light/dark cycle, equivalent to an eastbound flight.
"These results suggest that sildenafil may be useful for treatment of circadian adaptation to environmental changes, including transmeridian eastbound flight schedules," the researchers argue.
"A potential jet lag treatment for advancing cycles could also be important for the safety of counter-clockwise rotating shift work and the potential long-term health consequences for airline crews regularly crossing time zones," they write.
"Sildenafil could also be useful in other circadian disorders that involve poor synchronization with the environment, including delayed sleep-phase syndrome and adaptation to changing light schedules."