Andropause -What You Need To Know

More common known as the ‘male menopause’, andropause is not a condition as well studied as menopause. Dr Peter Ng, a consultant urological surgeon tells us all about it

- Lorraine Chai

George, a 50-year-old overweight executive working in a large insurance firm in KL had been having difficulties at work over the last six months. His sales figures were down and his colleagues noticed he was not his usual cheery, life-of-the-party self; the one always with a well-placed comeback or on the offensive with a cheeky backhanded compliment.

George had difficulty concentrating and colleagues caught him dozing off during afternoon meetings. Just two weeks prior, his diabetic and hypertensive medications had to be readjusted. George’s wife noticed that he wasn’t very interested in sex anymore and on more than a few occasions, he had not been able to ‘perform’, leaving the both of them unsatisfied and she, suspicious that he had been expending his energy on ‘extracurricular’ activities. His doctor had been prescribing the magic blue pill –Viagra – over the last six months and while it really lived up to its much-vaunted reputation initially, things went downhill steadily as well.

George’s wife finally decided that ‘enough was enough’ and after reading about a phenomenon called ‘andropause’, she literally dragged him to the doctor’s, insisting to the rather bemused physician that her husband had andropause.

George filled in a questionnaire, had his blood taken and the doctor confirmed his wife’s very astute observations and ‘diagnosis’. George began hormone replacement treatment with testosterone as well as a regime of diet and exercise. George’s scenario is common all over the world but it’s easily missed or misdiagnosed as anxiety or a psychological problem.

WHAT IS ANDROPAUSE?