But they are here. Why else would they be here on this website let alone this sub thread if finasteride worked.
If one new person comes to this website and reads this poll (which clearly shows that people do experience sexual sides on finasteride) and I can save them from what I went through then it was worth it.
Did you read the other report saying that finasteride Doesn’t cause sexual side effects? We’ve already proven it’s not fact.
Kiwi man, my friend, I'm sorry to strongly disagree with you in this one. The fact that Finasteride causes side effects IS NOT because you forum people have proven it. This poll hasn't proven it, and the scattered anecdotal accounts in the forum havent proven it either. It has been the formal studies published as scientific articles that have proven it. We have known that those effects exist because of that since years ago.
Side effects are a thing, but it affects a WAY smaller percentage of people than what most forum members here think, so the probability for a user to get those sides DUE to finasteride are actually low (around 5%, at most 15%).
I will tell you the 2 main reason why this poll fails and departs from an accurate estimation, even though other members have already pointed this out in in other words:
1) No control group (failing to account for Placebo) : when evaluating the effect of anything on a biological entity, a control experimental group is a must. It is the most basic feature of any decent experimental design. The placebo effect is a scientifically proven thing, and it is strong, so a control group must be added to account for that effect. Most classic studies on finas have implemented it and obviously, when accounting for placebo, the estimated percentage of people presenting sides DUE to the pill is greatly reduced. Why? Because a great deal of people taking sugar pills also get those sides. This is done for any medication there is. A simple poll like this one cannot account for that in any way, no matter how much the members claim to "know" very well their own bodies.
2) Sampling bias (non random sampling): perfectly random sampling is another sacred rule in statistics whenever you are going to test an hypothesis. In this case, it means you should take a random, representative sample of the whole population that is taking finasteride. Now, the poll is performed over a non-random subpopulatiom of finas users: a hairloss forums. This forum tends to attract mostly two type of hairloss users: the ones who get sides on the most common (and efficient) treatment option (finasteride) and are desperately looking for alternatives, and also the ones who are not responding well to the best treatment options (I.e. Are still losing hair). So, the vast majority of users that are regrowing/maintaining hair and/or are not having any sides..are simply living their lives and have no reason at all to be on forums like this one. So the results of a poll made on this forums are obviously going to report as a majority the experiences of a minority in the universal sample. Sampling bias at its best expression.
So yeah, keeping this into account, as
@Pigeon n said, the results are not surprising.
Also, because of these things, and because humans are conscious entities prone to placebo effects, this forums act as echo chambers of side effects reports that magnify the fear of sides for newcoming baldities, which in turn greatly increases their chances of experiencing sides in the future because of the psychological predisposition acquired here.
Bottom line, does finasteride cause real sides? Yes. But to a small fraction of people when accounting for sampling bias and placebo. And even then, this wasnt proved by anything coming from this forum.
