New Study – Finasteride Use in Japanese Men
Snippet from the study:
Before now, there has been no study of finasteride use exceeding 1 year in Japanese men with androgenetic alopecia (AGA) except the study subsequently conducted from the development phase. Since the launch of finasteride, no study in a larger population had been reported. Ethnic variation of the onset age, progressive nature and degree of hair loss of androgenetic alopecia are known. The therapeutic effect of oral finasteride (Propecia) was examined on androgenetic alopecia of Japanese men. The efficacy and safety of finasteride (1 mg tablet) was evaluated in Japanese men with AGA in the long term.
Read the full abstract — Evaluation of efficacy and safety of finasteride 1mg in 3177 Japanese men with androgenetic alopecia.
A new study has been published on the use of finasteride 1mg in the Japanese Journal of Dermatology, addressing the safety and effectiveness of finasteride in 3177 balding men, and the impact on 2561 men in this group was observed. Safety data was obtained by interviews and laboratory tests. Of the 2561 men who followed through the study, the published report says that “the overall effect of hair growth was seen in 2230 of 2561 men (87.1%), in whom hair greatly (11.1%), moderately (36.5%) and slightly (39.5%) increased”.
Adverse reactions were reported in 23 of 3177 (0.7%). It is interesting that the higher degree of sexual side effects in some other studies were not matched in this study at a single Japanese institution. If one subtracted the placebo group’s side effects in the US studies, the number seems to come closer to this recent Japanese report. The article also showed increasing benefits over time in those individuals who had the best results from the drug.
Over/Under 1 day before Jeremy makes a post on here discounting the credibility of this study?
There isn’t necessarily anything wrong with the study but it wasn’t designed to look at finasteride side effects. They didn’t follow up w/ any of the men who discontinued the drug due to side effects to see if their problems had reversed. Many of the men who developed side effects on the drug decided to continue taking the drug so we cannot induce anything about the reversibility of their problems either. Given that we know permanent side effects is not very common in the population, we wouldn’t expect it to show up in overwhelming numbers.
The study itself seems fine but you need to particularly tailor the study to a specific research question if you want to address the reversibility of sexual dysfunction. This study was not designed for that purpose so it does not offer any conclusion either way.
“Doctor” L – I think it is quite poetic that you are guilty of the same act of which you have falsely accused me.
You appear to not have read even the first sentence of my post. If you have read it, I would strongly urge you to brush up on your reading comprehension.
While I said the study seemed to be reasonable methodologically, it was not designed to test for the permanence of rare side effects. Given the rarity of the side effects, a sample size of 3,000 will have very little explanatory power in determining the statistical significance of such a hypothesis.
It would require much more than reading an abstract to understand the inherent biases, prejudices, and methodological flaws in any study, and these will not even entirely be found within the article itself. I am not sure if the authors are affiliated with Merck (this does not appear to be the case) and hence they are freed from some of the crippling conflicts of interests that plague the pharmaceutical trial process in the US and other developed countries.
It’s great to see that studies are still being conducted that further state the safety of the medication. You can read forums and hear everyone complaining about side effects, people swearing up and down that Merck falsified the side effects and tried to cover up data about the truth… But when you see long-term studies like this on such a large group of men that result in such an insignificant number of patients experiencing side effects it puts everything right back into perspective.