Dr. Steven Kaplan on the rationale for an oral formulation of sildenafil for ED

In this video, Steven A. Kaplan, MD, discusses the reasoning for developing ASP-001, an investigational oral formulation of sildenafil for patients with erectile dysfunction. Kaplan is a professor of urology at the Icahn School of Medicine and director of the Men’s Wellness Program at Mount Sinai in New York, New York.

Video Transcript:

One of the things, both as a clinician and someone who now has a lot of friends asking me for prescriptions for PDE5 inhibitors like sildenafil or vardenafil or tadalafil, is, particularly with the first 2, there's a food effect. People will say, "well, it's not working." The first question I always ask them is, "well, are you taking it with food?" People don't realize that there's a significant food effect. So, the concept behind delivering something orally in a spray is to hopefully avoid the whole GI effect and get faster absorption. That was the reason why. We wanted to make something that would work potentially faster and quicker and also be simpler. Carrying around pills in your pocket and your wallet is weird and awkward, but having something that potentially could work quicker and without a food effect, potentially––that was the concept behind it. This is why it was developed, to make it easier and hopefully more effective for patients.

This transcription has been edited for clarity.

Kaplan is a member of the medical advisory board for Aspargo Labs.