Article about BCP and sex drive

[Annette]

I found an interesting article today on CNN's medpage regarding sex drive and birth control pills. If anyone is in the medical field, can you please explain the medical terminology in the article? It's a bit over my head....

http://www.medpagetoday.com/OBGYN/HRT/tb/2423

Inform patients who ask taking oral contraceptives that use of birth control pills has been associated in a small retrospective study with elevated sex hormone-binding globulin levels and reduced bioavailable testosterone. This effect may persist even after discontinuation of oral contraceptive use.

Oral contraceptives may have lingering negative effects on women's sexual health, according to researchers here.

A analysis of blood samples showed that women who had discontinued taking birth control pills six months earlier showed sex hormone-binding globulin levels that were almost double than levels seen in women with no history of OC use (P<0.0001), found Claudia Panzer, M.D., of Boston University and colleagues........

[j*east]

I'm no doctor, but I think it means that even after women stop taking BCP, some have reduced sex drives.

I'd be curious to hear an informed opinion, though.

[off2skl]

retrospective study means they are looking at women now with the "elevated sex hormone-binding globulin levels and reduced bioavailable testosterone" and workign backward to see what they may have had in common (in this case they have concluded that that's BCP)

Bioavailable testosterone I would take as meaning testosterone not bound (aparently it binds to the globulin mentioned and women taking BCP have higher levels of the globulin which would translate into more sites for the testosterone to bind to). When we talk about drugs, only those that are free or unbound can be metabolized, but I'm not sure if the same can be said for testosterone). It is believed that libido is linked in part to testosterone levels.

It sounds like this continues even after discontinuation of the BCP, but the study did not investigate how long until these levels return to normal.

Hope that helps a bit.

[BTB]

retrospective study means they are looking at women now with the "elevated sex hormone-binding globulin levels and reduced bioavailable testosterone" and workign backward to see what they may have had in common (in this case they have concluded that that's BCP)

Actually, in this study the starting point was sexual dysfunction (of unknown etiology, prior to blood tests.) Subjects were sorted according to BCP status, and blood tests were performed in which current BCP users were compared to previous users and never users. Subjects' sex-hormone binding globulin status was not known prior to study completion, it was the surprising finding that these were different.

The rest has been covered, but if anything remains unclear, fire away w/questions. :)