Sex Important For Older Women

Study Says Sex Doesn't Have To End After Menopause

(WebMD)  "I don't think there is anything unique about the heart disease thing," Bashuk tells WebMD. "The idea many people have is if you have heart disease you are unable to have sex. But that is not true among men and it is not true among women."

Addis says the main sexual problems reported by women with heart disease were discomfort during sex — mostly due to vaginal dryness — and lack of sexual interest.

"Every day in my practice I see women who complain of lack of interest in sex and problems with arousal," Bashuk says. "Lack of interest, in my experience, is mainly due to a side effect of antidepressants. About 30 percent of women in that age group use them. And a lot of the heart medications have these side effects. So a lot of times this is medical."

Vaginal discomfort, too, may have a medical solution.

"Once the body loses estrogen, women get vaginal dryness," Bashuk says. "That can be treated with topical estrogen that will not have the cardiac problems a hormone pill would have."


Great Sex After 60

Women with heart disease are often afraid to have sex, says sex therapist and psychologist Jeanne Shaw, PhD.

"Anybody who has ever had a chest pain or a heart attack or a diagnosis of heart disease has got that fear that an orgasm is going to kill them, or that the exertion of a sexual encounter will give them another heart attack," Shaw tells WebMD. "But if they can climb two flights of stairs without chest pain or shortness of breath, they can have sex without fear."

What many people fail to realize, Shaw says, is that women are sexy in their 60s and beyond.