Sildenafil in the Treatment of Erectile Dysfunction

To the Editor: In their study of sildenafil in men with erectile dysfunction, Goldstein et al. (May 14 issue) 1 found that the drug had few major side effects. I would like to bring to your attention two cases of ventricular tachycardia that occurred within one hour after ingestion of sildenafil. Patient 1 was a 52-year-old man who had a large myocardial infarction of the anterior wall 20 years ago, which resulted in an enlarged left ventricle and a severely depressed ejection fraction, but he had never had ventricular tachycardia. One hour after taking sildenafil, during sexual activity with his girlfriend, . . .