For now, the knowledge that this is an actual physical condition may give a sense of relief to those affected by it, and help clinicians in making accurate assessment and diagnosis. There is clearly a lot left to learn about POIS, its prevalence in the male (and possibly female) population, what causes it, and how best to treat it. (Also, this study did not involve a randomized placebo-controlled design, so the jury is still out on the treatment’s effectiveness.) However, this treatment takes some serious dedication and needles tolerance: The injections were administered every two weeks for the first year, then once a month for the next two years. The two patients in the study reported improvements in symptoms after 15 and 31 months of injections (and one of them also reported improvement of his premature ejaculation). One lab even tried to treat POIS using “hyposensitization therapy”: By repeatedly administering under-the-skin injections containing diluted concentrations of a man’s own semen, gradually increasing concentrations over time so the body slowly adjusts to it. Unsurprisingly, this strains men's relationships with existing romantic partners, and hinders their future relationship prospects.īecause POIS is a rare and little-understood condition, there are no recognized treatment protocols for it. Patients with these symptoms have been treated with everything from antihistamines and nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs, like diclofenac) to selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRs) and benzodiazepines. Another theory suggests it might be a chemical imbalance in the brain similar to opioid withdrawal: Orgasm in these men may be consuming larger quantities of endogenous opioids compared to most men, triggering an opioid withdrawal-like state.Īs you can imagine, POIS causes severe distress and inconvenience for the men affected by it, leading many of them to limit how often they have sex or to avoid sex altogether (despite having desire for it), or having to plan their ejaculations so that their aftermath doesn’t interfere with work or studying. One theory is that it’s an autoimmune or allergic reaction to a substance in the man’s semen (sperm itself, prostate fluid, or another component of the seminal fluid) in other words, these men are allergic to their own semen. The causes of POIS are not well understood. Until recently, this syndrome was thought to only affect men however, POIS was recently reported in a woman in the medical literature, so it is possible that this condition also affects a small percentage of women. However, there are more and more self-reports of POIS on internet forums, suggesting that it might be more common that we think but often goes undiagnosed and underreported because people aren’t aware of its existence or are too embarrassed to disclose to health care providers. POIS was first described in 2002 and seems to be a rare disorder, with only about 50 total cases ever described in the medical literature. It also seems that POIS and premature ejaculation may often go hand in hand: In one study of 45 Dutch men with POIS, 56% reported lifelong premature ejaculation (defined there as ejaculation after less than 1 minute of intercourse). In either case, the symptoms must occur always or nearly always (more than 90% of the time they orgasm) in order to be diagnosed. In some men, this occurs from their very first ejaculation ( primary POIS), while for others, it develops later in life ( secondary POIS).
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