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If you would prefer the convenience and confidentiality of ordering your drugs online, there is a safe alternative. Secure Medical Inc., based in Tempe, Arizona, operates a network of online drugstores that sell only FDA-approved drugs, all of which are sourced from licensed U.S. pharmacies.

Websites in the Secure Medical network include AccessRx.com, eDrugstore.com, and Viamedic.com. All sell a full range of ED medications, as well as a number of other prescription and OTC drugs.

For those who have a prescription from their doctors, they can fax it or scan and email it along with their order. However, if you don’t have a prescription, each of these websites can arrange a complimentary online consultation with a member of its team of licensed U.S. physicians.

You will be required to complete a questionnaire covering your current symptoms, medical history, and a list of all prescription and OTC drugs you’re now taking. If the doctor concludes that you’re an appropriate candidate for Viagra or another of the prescription drugs these websites offer, he or she will authorize a prescription.

Teva Pharmaceuticals USA is scheduled to introduce its generic formulation of Viagra beginning in December 2017. Likely to follow soon thereafter is a generic version of the drug from Mylan. Under FDA regulations, all generic substitutes for Viagra — or any brand-name drug, for that matter — must contain the same active ingredients as the branded drug.

The offerings from Teva and Mylan will be sold under the generic name sildenafil citrate, as will all generic versions of the drug that may follow.

FDA regulations do not require that a generic drug’s inactive ingredients replicate those in the brand-name drug, but since such ingredients are chemically inert, it has no real effect on the consumer. The primary effect of generic competition for Viagra will be to exert downward price pressure on the brand-name drug, as Pfizer seeks to continue to appeal to some buyers who’d prefer to stick with the original little blue pill.

As more and more generic versions hit the market, competitive pressures will increase, pushing average prices for the drug still lower.

Unless you know the reputation of an online vendor, buying Viagra and other ED drugs online can be a very risky proposition. It’s been estimated that roughly 90 percent of the ED drugs advertised online are counterfeit.

More importantly, many of these drugs contain potentially toxic ingredients, including dry wall material used as filler and printing ink used as a coloring agent. It’s true that some of these drugs have been found to contain the active ingredients in brand-name ED drugs but at levels that are either too low to be effective or so high that they could be dangerous.

Such ingredients are not listed on the drugs’ labels, so the consumer has no way of knowing the amount of active ingredient he may be getting. Unless you know you’re ordering from a trustworthy online supplier, it’s best to avoid buying ED drugs online.

Doctors who specialize in the treatment of cancer have long sought ways to attack cancer cells that ironically are sometimes protected by the body’s immune system. Researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virginia, found that combining sildenafil with a derivative of celecoxib, a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug sometimes marketed as Celebrex, successfully killed brain cancer stem cells.

The combination works by targeting a protein known as GRP78, a so-called chaperone protein that serves to protect the integrity of certain cells, including certain cancer cells.

The combination succeeded in doing an end run around GRP78 to attack and kill the cancer cells. Moreover, the combination of sildenafil with the celecoxib derivative called OSU-03012, also known as AR-12, has potent antimicrobial properties.

Scientists said this combination drug could also prove effective in treating viral infections such as influenza, hepatitis, and Ebola, as well as antibiotic-resistant bacteria such MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus).

Doctors who specialize in the treatment of cancer have long sought ways to attack cancer cells that ironically are sometimes protected by the body’s immune system. Researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virginia, found that combining sildenafil with a derivative of celecoxib, a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug sometimes marketed as Celebrex, successfully killed brain cancer stem cells.

The combination works by targeting a protein known as GRP78, a so-called chaperone protein that serves to protect the integrity of certain cells, including certain cancer cells.

The combination succeeded in doing an end run around GRP78 to attack and kill the cancer cells. Moreover, the combination of sildenafil with the celecoxib derivative called OSU-03012, also known as AR-12, has potent antimicrobial properties.

Scientists said this combination drug could also prove effective in treating viral infections such as influenza, hepatitis, and Ebola, as well as antibiotic-resistant bacteria such MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus).

Viagra is probably your best bet if you suffer from impotence caused by vascular insufficiency, but other options are available for those who find that the drug doesn’t work for them or who suffer from ED that stems from other causes. Others may find that they can’t tolerate some of Viagra’s side effects, which are usually mild but can be particularly bothersome to those sensitive to the drug’s effects.

Other options for the treatment of ED include penile injection therapy, which involves the injection of a vasodilating drug — alprostadil most often — directly into the penis minutes before sexual activity is expected to begin.

This form of treatment has a very high success rate but isn’t for those who find it difficult, if not impossible, to picture themselves injecting a needle into the penis. Other options include penile implants, which range in sophistication from a flexible rod surgically implanted that can be manipulated into place for sexual activity to more advanced systems. The latter usually consist of plastic cylinders that replace the penis’s corpora cavernosa — twin columns of spongy erectile tissue — and can be filled on demand with fluid pumped from a reservoir implanted under the skin of the lower abdomen.