Persistent Sexual Dysfunction and Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors: Myth or Reality?

Abstract

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors antidepressants are psychopharmaceuticals frequently used in clinical practice in the fields of General Practice and Psychiatry for the treatment of depressive and anxiety disorders. The high prescription of this class of antidepressants results from their profile of efficacy, safety and tolerability.
It is clinically consensual that this pharmacological class can interfere with the various phases of the sexual response during antidepressant treatment. However, more and more cases have been reported in the literature, in which sexual dysfunction is not reversible after discontinuation of the drug, configuring a new persistent clinical entity, whose pathophysiological substrate is currently under intense scientific investigation. Reviewing the recent published literature in this matter and raising awareness of physicians about this new entity reveals itself as a priority with potential implications, particularly on the approach of psychiatric pathologies so prevalent in the current society.