How often couples have sex, and is it all over too quickly? Find out here…

The question of how frequently couples have sex on a weekly basis is one long debated, but something nobody will ever be sure of the answer to as one couple’s sex life differs to the next.

However, a sexual health expert from the US believes that the average couple tend to have sex around two to three times per week.

Dr Harry Fisch, a urologist based at the New York Presbyterian Hospital, also claims that men are generally not lasting long enough in the sack to fully satisfy their partner as men tend to orgasm a lot quicker than women do.

According to Dr Fisch, around 45% of men usually orgasm within just two minutes of beginning penetrative sex, a time that is too soon for the average woman to reach an orgasm.

In a report published on Nerve.com, he says that the majority of women actually require a time of between five to seven minutes to reach orgasm – resulting in a lot of unsatisfied women in the bedroom.

Dr Fisch goes on to say the average man has 11 erections each day and there are some young men who see having sex multiple days a day as being normal, although he adds in reality, this is not a common occurrence.

In reality, most couples are having sex in their 20s about every one to three days he believes, with this dropping to twice a week for 30 to 50-year-olds.

Some couples are content with having frequent sex, with other couples prioritising quality over quantity. He wrote in Nerve.com: “That’s really the point: not how much sex you’re having, but whether you and your partner are happy with the sex you are having. Quality wins out over quantity every time. It’s all about the satisfaction.”

The average couple has sex for 7.3 minutes at a time says Dr Fisch, but he adds this isn’t always satisfactory for the woman as women usually take longer to orgasm.

He concluded his report by urging those men who regularly ejaculate in less than two minutes, or take more than 40, to see their doctor.

For those who are concerned they are suffering from premature ejaculation (PE), your doctor can provide a diagnosis and speak to you about available treatments. Before this however, the website Firing Too Quickly offers a Premature Ejaculation Diagnostic Tool (PEDT); the results of which can be used when first discussing the problem with your doctor.

The Firing Too Quickly website is a fantastic guide for any man who believes he has premature ejaculation problems and offers information on a wide range of issues such as the psychical and psychological causes of PE, the difference between lifelong PE (primary) and acquired PE (secondary), in addition to some of the common myths and truths about PE.

For instance, a misconception some people hold is that PE is not a genuine medical condition. As Firing Too Quickly correctly point out, this is a myth and is even acknowledged by the World Health Organization as being a genuine health problem. PE can leave the male suffering from anxiety, stress, depression, embarrassment and anger.

Ultimately, both partners will suffer. The man may find it difficult to relax enough to enjoy sex resulting in a lack of intimacy and frustration for both the man and woman. If left untreated, PE can place serious strain on the relationship.

Treatment options can be obtained today from Medical Specialists™ Pharmacy and include over the counter products such as Stud 100 spray and/or the prescription-only medication Priligy – the latter works to prolong a man’s sexual performance by an average of 200% to 300%.

Premature ejaculation can be improved with pelvic floor exercises

Pelvic floor exercises are normally suggested to women who are pregnant, or planning to get pregnant.  Such exercises can strengthen the pelvic floor muscles and lessen the risk of the woman experiencing urinary incontinence and reduced sensitivity during sex following the birth of their child. Strong pelvic floor muscles will result in increased sensitivity during sex and stronger orgasms as well.

However, new research has suggested that pelvic floor exercises can also help men – in particular those who are suffering from premature ejaculation problems.

Study data from Sapienza University of Rome was presented at the European Congress of Urology in Stockholm earlier this week, demonstrating how pelvic floor exercises can be effective in delaying ejaculation for men. This showed for the very first time that these exercises are beneficial for men who have suffered with premature ejaculation on a long-term basis.

The research, led by Dr. Antonio Pastore, looked at 40 men aged between 19 and 46. The men all suffered with premature ejaculation but not not seen results from other types of therapy. For a period of 12 weeks, the men were trained to exercise their pelvic floor muscles and also asked to track their time-to-orgasm over this period.

The men’s average ejaculation time at the beginning of the study was measured at just 31.7 seconds, but at the end of the 12 week study period, this average ejaculation time jumped up to 146.2 seconds (two and a half minutes). This equates to an increase in excess of 400%.

In total, an impressive number of men benefited from the pelvic floor exercises, with 33 of the 40 men experiencing improvements to ejaculation time during the course of the study and only five did not see any significant improvement. Two men quit the study earlier than the rest, but had seen improvement prior to dropping out. Thirteen of those 33 carried on with the trial for a further six months and their improved ejaculation times were maintained.

One person’s perception of what constitutes premature ejaculation may differ to somebody else’s and some men may mistakenly assume they have the condition, but the International Society of Sexual Medicine defines premature ejaculation as “ejaculation within a minute.”

Some men’s premature ejaculation problems can be so severe that sex can prove near impossible, especially if he ejaculates before penetration. This can be hugely damaging for a man’s self-confidence, and frustrating for both partners especially if they are trying for a baby.

Health experts generally, and rightfully, see premature ejaculation as a genuine medical condition requiring treatment, which can be done through over the counter products such as Stud 100 spray and/or the prescription-only medication Priligy. The latter works to prolong a man’s sexual performance by an average of 200% to 300%.

How long do American men last for in the bedroom?

Men in New Mexico are able to lay claim to a surprising boast after new research suggests that on average, they last longer in the bedroom compared to those in all the other states across the United States.

An smartphone mobile app named Spreadsheets which tracks the ‘duration, thrusts, and decibel peak’ of a couple’s sexual rhythm, analysed the data from 10,000 of its users to assess just how long couples from different states in America were lasting for.

According to the Spreadsheets app website, the technology works by monitoring ‘user’s movement and audio levels through the accelerometer and microphone to provide statistical and visual analysis of their performance in bed’. Those using the app can unlock 30 ‘achievements’ – a points-based system where couples can set targets or challenges for themselves, such as earning ten points for early morning sex.

For those concerned about privacy, you might be relieved to learn that the app will not record or playback audio or video and all data is stored securely on a person’s mobile device and information will never be relayed, backed up, or synced to the internet, according to the Spreadsheets website.
New Mexico, a state located in the southwest and western regions  of the United States, topped the average intercourse time (excluding foreplay) with just over seven minutes, compared to a mere average time of 81 seconds in the state of Alaska.

The full list was as follows:

1. New Mexico (7:01)
2. West Virginia (5:38)
3. Idaho (5:11)
4. South Carolina (4:48)
5. Missouri (4:22)
6. Michigan (4:14)
7. Utah (3:55)
8. Oregon (3:51)
9. Nebraska (3:47)
10. Alabama (3:38)
11. Delaware (3:33)
12. Hawaii (3:28)
13. Wisconsin (3:22)
14. North Dakota (3:18)
15. Arizona (3:17)
16. Maryland (3:15)
17. Mississippi (3:10)
18. Rhode Island (3:09)
19. Connecticut (3:07)
20. Texas (3:06)
21. New Hampshire (3:04)
22. Wyoming (3:03)
23. New York (3:01)
24. Pennsylvania (2:58)
25. Maine (2:58)
26. Washington (2:51)
27. Iowa (2:50)
28. Illinois (2:49)
29. North Carolina (2:47)
30. Tennessee (2:46)
31. Kansas (2:38)
32. California (2:38)
33. Massachusetts (2:31)
34. Florida (2:29)
35. New Jersey (2:28)
36. Indiana (2:26)
37. Virginia (2:23)
38. Oklahoma (2:21)
39. Colorado (2:21)
40. Minnesota (2:19)
41. Ohio (2:18)
42. Louisiana (2:17)
43. Kentucky (2:14)
44. Arkansas (2:08)
45. District of Columbia (2:08)
46. Nevada (2:07)
47. Georgia (2:07)
48. Montana (2:03)
49. Vermont (1:48)
50. South Dakota (1:30)
51. Alaska (1:21)

Precisely how long sexual intercourse should last can vary from one couple to the next, i.e. what is satisfying for one couple may not be satisfactory for another. The 2009 study ‘Canadian and American Sex Therapists’ Perceptions of Normal and Abnormal Ejaculatory Latencies: How Long Should Intercourse Last?’, determined that sexual intercourse usually ranges from three to seven minutes on average and another study found the average time was five and a half minutes from the moment of penetration to ejaculation.

For a man to ejaculate prior to or within a minute of penetration, this is usually deemed to be a genuine medical condition requiring treatment through over the counter products such as Stud 100 spray and/or the prescription-only medication Priligy – the latter works to prolong a man’s sexual performance by an average of 200% to 300%.

As highlighted earlier, sometimes a man’s premature ejaculation problems are so severe that sex is a seemingly impossible task as he ejaculated before entering the vagina. This can be hugely damaging for a man’s self-confidence, and frustrating for both partners especially if they are trying for a baby.

Your love life could be boosted by getting your 5 a day

For many years those unlucky in love have perhaps wondered what the secret(s) is to achieve and maintain a happy, healthy and active love life.

Obviously there are medications such as impotence drug Viagra or premature ejaculation treatments Priligy and Stud 100 spray, which can all provide a huge/satisfying boost between the bed sheets.

However, according to the findings of a new study, getting your 5 a day portion of fruit and vegetables can not only benefit your health in a number of ways, it can also improve your love life.

In particularly, the study suggests that people who consume plenty of fruit and vegetables emit a radiant glow which makes them more appealing to potential partners. The researchers behind the study think that over time we have generally associated bronzed skin with good health, and this glowing good skin that is given off from a high fruit and veg intake may subconsciously help to pick out a good mate and avoid the unhealthier of society.

For the study, published in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters, researchers from York, St Andrews and Cambridge University snapped photographs of 20 men and women, manipulating them to produce four different versions.

One version depicted faces radiating a golden glow, clearly showing the advantageous effect of eating plenty of fruit and veg, whilst another version of the pictures showed a significantly less healthy complexion of the results of steering clear of the salad bowl!

The third and fourth sets also had differing tones of skin, but with faces that were changed to abstract pictures, unidentifiable as human.

Volunteers were then drafted in to view the pictures and judge how ‘attractive’ they deemed the images to be.

Yellowness of the abstract images appeared to have little impact on each person’s opinion, but interestingly the more golden faces were rated as better looking.

This would hint that yellow is maybe not a colour we particularly find attractive in general, but provides information as part of a person’s skin tone.

York University researcher Dr Carmen Lefevre said: “This suggests we use it in other people as a quick of who could be health and, perhaps more importantly, who may be unhealthy.  You don’t want to touch someone who has an illness you might catch.”

For those who really do not like their greens, there is good news in that even eating a small amount can have an impact.

Dr Lefevre, who is working up to eating five-a-day, said: “Other work we have shown that eating one or two more portions makes a visible difference after only four weeks.”

Her work may explain to some extent why people sometimes describe others with a tan as having a ‘healthy glow’.

Dr Lefevre added: “Some other work that our lab has done indicates that people prefer a tan to no tan. However, they seem to prefer the carotenoid colour more than a tan. Eating more fruit is better than going in the sun.”

Of course, there are a multitude of reasons to get your 5 a day intake of fruit and vegetables, besides looking more appealing to the opposite sex! Here is a detailed list of the 5 a day benefits, and information on what counts as one of the portions.

Premature ejaculation a big problem for couples in China

It would be interesting to find out corresponding results for UK women after a recent online survey showed that incredibly there could be around 96% of women in China who are not satisfied with their sexual partners.

Typical points for complaint from the female respondents included the fact that sexual intercourse was not lasting long enough (under 15 minutes), or their male partner having a sexual health problem.

In fact, over a fifth (22%) of the women who completed the survey laim they have ended a relationship or even divorced their husband because of persistent premature ejaculation problems. Moreover, 21% of men have also ended relationships for similar reasons.

Premature ejaculation is, and should, be considered a genuine medical problem that still requires treatment like anything else and as such, there are options available for men with premature ejaculation. Priligy and Stud 100 spray are just two popular treatments.

The report, published on Sept. 25 by the International Society for Sexual Medicine in Beijing, states that over half of Chinese couples are unhappy with their sex lives.

Furthermore, 96% of women and 80% of men claim that they are not enjoying sexual intercourse for sustained periods.  In comparison to other countries in the Asia-Pacific region, the figures for China are actually higher, according to the report.

The study into sexual health or other such issues was conducted over the duration of six months and included 3,567 people spanning across nine countries and territories in the Asia-Pacific region, including: Australia, South Korea, Malaysia and the Philippines.

However, it seems that on average, Chinese couples engage in sexual intercourse around nine times a month on average. This is higher than the overall average for the region of 7.7.

The old saying of ‘quality, not quantity’ could be true though and indeed the amount of times couples had sex was not found to be the primary factor in sexual well-being. Instead, libido, willingness to actually have sex, in addition to intimacy levels in the relationship, were discovered to be far more important.

Jiang Hui, a physician studying male reproductive medicine at Peking University Third Hospital says that a large proportion of his patients are concerned they are unable to satisfy their partners sexually and of these patients, over 80% suffer with premature ejaculation.

Jiang also says that a lot of patients mistakenly think that premature ejaculation is purely only down to psychological issues like pressure, stress and fatigue. He says this is the main reason that a lot of men in China do not seek any kind of treatment for premature ejaculation.

More younger men are now suffering from erectile dysfunction

Erectile dysfunction (ED), also known as male impotence, is a very common condition affecting almost half of men between 40 to 70 years of age on at least one occasion.

The inability to achieve and maintain an erection satisfactory for sexual intercourse is often mistakenly assumed to be an ‘older’ man’s condition and something that surely could not affect a male under the age of 40…wrong!

In fact, Medical Specialists Pharmacy deals with thousands of patients every year who are requesting ED treatments such as Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra. The stigma attached to this genuine health problem seems to be finally subsiding as men banish their worries and embrace these highly effective treatments.

And now, a new study published in the The Journal of Sexual Medicine has revealed that approximately a quarter of men under the age of 40 are seeking treatment to combat erectile dysfunction, and almost half (48%) of these men were actually suffering with severe ED.

“Erectile function, in general, is a marker for overall cardiovascular function — this is the first research showing evidence of severe erectile dysfunction in a population of men 40 years of age or younger’ Irwin Goldstein, editor-in-chief of The Journal of Sexual Medicine, commented in a statement.

Goldstein continued: “Clinically, when younger patients have presented with erectile dysfunction, we have in the past had a bias that their ED was primarily psychologic-based and vascular testing was not needed. We now need to consider regularly assessing the integrity of arterial inflow in young patients — identifying arterial pathology in such patients may be very relevant to their overall long-term health.”

Prevalence of ED would seem to increase in correlation with age; however studies of younger men have painted a confusing picture of the true extent of the problem, with prevalence rates varying from between 2 and 40%.

Therefore, Paolo Capogrosso, MD, of the University Vita-Salute San Raffaele, in Milan, Italy, and a team of researchers assessed the clinical and sociological factors of 439 men who had attended one particular academic outpatient clinic requesting first-time medical assistance for impotence problems between January 2010 and June 2012.

From the 439 men, it was found that 114 (26%) were aged 40 or under. Younger patients were determined to have a lower average body mass index, a higher average level of testosterone in their blood, in addition to a lower rate of any other medical issues. However, they generally smoked more cigarettes and took more illicit drugs compared to older patients; both have been known to contribute to impotence problems in men.

Another common problem for men – premature ejaculation – was found to be more prominent in younger men, whilst Peyronie’s disease (where scar tissue causes a bending/deformity of the penis) was more common in the older patients.

More studies may have to be conducted that cover a much large, varied demographic, but the findings of this study could suggest that the condition may be affecting a lot more younger men than health experts predict.

It could be that some men may not wish to share their problems with anybody else, especially their own GP, and this may explain why at Medical Specialists we are seeing a rapidly increasing number of men turning to us for help in treating something that can be deeply distressing and can have a major impact on a man’s self-esteem and relationship with his partner.

For information on how to obtain the previously mentioned treatments for erectile dysfunction; Viagra, Cialis and Levitra, in addition to premature ejaculation treatments such as Priligy and Stud 100 spray, visit the Men’s Health area of the Medical Specialists Pharmacy website.