It's mind over matter for women and sex

THE inequality of the sexes is apparent even in the treatment of sexual dysfunction.

Men can call on vacuum pumps, injections and now a little pill called Viagra to help them rise to the occasion. Women have nothing to arouse their interest in the bedroom.

Help may be at hand as modern medicine begins to understand the essence of male and female sexuality. While the answer to male problems may be physical, for a female it literally could be all in the mind.

Sexual Chemistry showed a clip from a 1972 edition of Horizon in which an expert said that most sexual problems were caused by anxiety about "performance, manliness, ageing, have I made her pregnant, living up to her orgasmic expectations". What's accepted now is that depression and anxiety are the symptoms not the cause.

A man who ran a tyre-retreading service in the US state of Georgia made the breakthrough. Geddings Osborn converted a bicycle pump into a vacuum pump that helped his erection difficulties.

That was the only solution for many years, until an injection became available. As this is instant, it doesn't fit into the natural rhythm of sex.

Viagra, which has been prescribed for 20 million men in the past five years, was discovered by accident during human trials for a pill to relieve the pain of angina. The makers discovered it stimulated not the heart but another part of the body. Unwittingly, they'd become sexual pioneers.

Women wanted the same. Horizon spoke to some who'd lost their sex drive. All wanted it back but doctors didn't know how to recover it. Tests on Viagra for women failed to produce the desired effect - desire. It was only effective in specific cases.

Dutch psychologist Ellan Laan didn't give up. Her trials involved monitoring women's response to erotic videos, one made by a woman and another made by a man. They reported being turned on more by the female-directed tape. This apparently proved that for women it's more in the mind than the underpants. Without a single cause for women's lack of sex drive, a solution is difficult to find.

A pony-tailed Scottish nurse, Dr Ian Russell, may have found the answer. He specialises in sexual dysfunction. A year ago, he began to treat male patients with a new drug for impotence. This works on an area of the brain that triggers an increase in desire - literally, sex on the brain.

A small study among women in Scotland taking the drug showed an increase in arousal, desire and overall satisfaction. Now a bigger trial has been set up.

Sometimes the solution is natural. Karen lost her sex drive after the birth of her third child. At the end of the programme, we learnt she'd found it again without the benefit of drugs - she'd fallen in love and was enjoying a happy sex life again.