Welcome to our Herbal Path arginine page
Arginine:
One of the more popular supplement ingredients for sexual dysfunction is L-arginine, also referred to as arginine. Arginine is required to carry out the synthesis of nitric oxide, a compound that, working through cGMP, relaxes blood vessels and allows more blood to flow through arteries. It has been hypothesized that taking extra arginine will increase nitric oxide levels and increase blood flow to the penis.
Arginine appears to offer some modest benefit for sexual dysfunction in men. A double-blind, placebo controlled trial of 50 men with erectile dysfunction tested arginine at a dose of 5,000 mg per day for six weeks. Only about a third of the participants who received arginine showed improvement, but that improvement was greater than the 10% improvement seen in the placebo group. Moreover, erectile dysfunction is caused by a variety of factors. L-arginine may be effective only in those men whose erectile dysfunction is due to low levels of nitric oxide. Studies in animals provide some evidence for effectiveness as well.
Although arginine alone has not been studied as a treatment for sexual dysfunction in women, a reasonably good preliminary double-blind trial found evidence for benefit with a combination treatment (ArginMax for Women) providing a daily dose of 2,500 mg of L-arginine, as well as amounts of Panax ginseng, Ginkgo biloba extract, damiana, plus numerous vitamins and minerals. In a four-week, double-blind study, 77 women with decreased libido were given either the combination product (ArginMax) or placebo. As expected, a high percentage of participants taking placebo showed improvement. However, participants taking the product showed statistically greater improvement such as increased reported sexual desire level in 71% of participants given the treatment vs. 42% in the placebo group. Other improvements noted included: relative satisfaction with sex life (74% vs. 37%), improved frequency of orgasms (47% vs. 30%), and improved clitoral sensation (53% vs. 35%). No significant side effects were seen in either group.