[Bioethical aspects of Viagra]

Viagra (sidenafil) has specific activity, and well demonstrated efficacy and tolerability, when used in patients with organic erectile dysfunction. Its mechanism of action besides in restoring a compromised function of erection by improving the vasodilation nitrogen oxide-mediated, through the inhibition of cGMP, in the corpus cavernosum. The drug should be used after giving a correct and complete information to physicians by several experts in the field, including the bioethicist, considering the complexity of the problem of sexuality. The bioethical perspectives of the drug should be considered in relation to the principles of totality (therapeutic principle), autonomy, freedom, responsibility, and integrity of medical profession. Viagra is of value both at the clinical level and moral level, provided the therapeutic principle and the principles of responsibility and freedom are respected in an ethic-anthropological dimension that accepts the personalistic principle of corporeity.