The Role of Plant-Based Diets in the Treatment of Erectile Dysfunction
A hard man is good to find
Mae West’s risqué play on the well-worn adage ‘A good man is hard to find’ has always made me giggle. But for men suffering the devastating impact of erectile dysfunction (ED) on their relationships and self-esteem, it’s no laughing matter.
Dr Terry Mason (pictured behind the Australian contingent at the International Plant-Based Nutrition Healthcare conference in San Diego last September) knows all about how ED affects men.
Aside from being the former Commissioner of Public Health for the city of Chicago, and now CEO of the Cook County Health and Hospitals System – the third largest public healthcare system in the United States – he is a practising urologist.
You may have seen him in the surprise smash-hit documentary Forks Over Knives. He explained how ED was ‘the canary in the coal mine’: a remarkably accurate early warning sign of cardiovascular disease. The same pathologies – atherosclerosis and endothelial dysfunction – that cause heart attacks and strokes, also cause ED. And that means that the foods that raise the risk of cardiovascular disease – meat, dairy products and eggs – also put men in the firing line for ED.
(In one of my favourite scenes from Forks Over Knives, an elderly Asian man who had undertaken Dr Caldwell Esselstyn’s plant-based nutrition program to reverse his advanced heart disease bashfully reports that one of the most-appreciated benefits of the program for he and the other male participants, was that they were now able to ‘raise the flag’ again ;-).)
In his presentation at the International Plant-Based Nutrition Healthcare Conference, Dr Mason candidly discussed the procedures that urologists offer to men who can’t achieve and maintain an erection. Even the women in the audience – including me! – winced and crossed their legs as he showed videos of pumps surgically implanted in the scrotum that have to be manually inflated and deflated (go ahead, use your imagination on that one), and other gruesome and invasive procedures.
You can view my summary of Dr Mason’s presentation in the International PBNHC Round-Up Webinar (2:02:08).
After watching these videos (through my fingers, I’ll admit), I had to wonder: How could any man consider it less extreme to be put to sleep and have his penis and scrotum cut open with a scalpel so a mechanical device can be inserted into them, than to change his diet in order to achieve normal sexual function?
Dr Mason clearly wonders this too.
Every year, Dr Mason exhorts the citizens of Chicago to join his Restart Program, in which he challenges people to eat a plant-based diet for one month. Remarkably, for many men afflicted with ED, as little as one month of plant-based eating will completely restore their sexual function – not to mention helping them lose weight, lower their cholesterol and blood pressure, and allowing many to reduce or stop taking prescribed medications.
So, what do you think? Would you prefer Viagra, or vegetables? Surgery, or salad? Would you rather have a penis pump, or get pumped on plants? Terry Mason’s message at the conference was that ED is treatable at any age… with a healthy plant-based diet.
