Trending December 2023 # 5 Things You Should Do To Improve Risk Management At Work # Suggested January 2024 # Top 19 Popular

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There are risks in everything we do, whether when we cross the road, how much we invest or make dietary choices. We can’t avoid risks, but we can mitigate its impact. The same thing goes for businesses. Companies face risk all the time.

When talking about risks in the corporate world, this refers to one or more unforeseen events that may affect the organization’s ability to achieve its objectives.

This could range from disruptions in the market, natural calamities, pandemics, changes in the company’s senior leadership, etc.

Risks differ in terms of severity and how much it can impact a company, which is why risk management should be an integral part of an organization’s strategy.

With efficient risk management, an organization can define and execute strategies that aim to prevent or reduce the company’s risks so that the business can continue to run smoothly.

Here are five things that you should do to improve risk management at work.

    Identify Risks Early

    Many risks can impact your organization, which is why it is critical to include risk management at the start of every project or task.

    Since you can’t predict what might happen in the future, strategic risk management helps you detect threats early on so that you can respond accordingly. Your risk management plan should be unique and tailored for your organization’s particular needs and challenges.

    “The best way to manage risk is to attempt to spot it and plan accordingly before it happens”, according to David Rowland, head of marketing at Engage EHS.

    This is why risk assessment software is now so important to a business. Using this software, you can make plans, spot potential risks, and then do everything you can to minimize their impact.

    Part of your risk management plan should include identifying various risks that can affect your business, whether it’s a legal risk, environmental, regulatory, etc. Make sure to track Early Warning Indicators (EWIs) of the different risks that you might face.

    Also read: Top 6 Tips to Stay Focused on Your Financial Goals

      Analyze and Describe Risks

      Once you have identified a risk, proceed to analyze and determine the scope of the risk. Your risk assessment process should also include distinguishing between the cause and effect of the risk. You must understand the link between the risk and the organization.

      Utilize a risk matrix to assess and prioritize all known risks. You should prioritize your risks based on the probability or how likely they are to occur and how much they can impact your business operations. Some risks can be just minor inconveniences, while there are risks that can threaten business continuity.

      While many risks can affect organizations. Do not think that risks are the same for all. Organizations have different situations and capabilities in terms of managing risks, so you need to understand how risks specifically affect your business.

        Use Appropriate Strategies to Manage Risk

        Use the 4Ts model to decide on how you should manage risks.

        Transferring risk –

        Assign an individual, group, or third party to be responsible for managing the impact of the risk.

        Tolerating risk –

        No action is taken to mitigate or reduce risk; however, the risk should still be monitored. This may be because the probability and impact of the risk are low.

        Treating risk –

        Control risk through actions that reduce the likelihood of the risk occurring or minimize its impact before it happens.

        Terminating risk –

        Also read: The 15 Best E-Commerce Marketing Tools

          Document All Risks in a Risk Register

          Make sure to capture all risks that your company faces so that you can see a complete picture of your entire organization’s risk exposure. It is critical that you document all the risks that your organization may be facing.

          If you have efficient documentation of risks, you will improve the sharing of information and enforce a sense of accountability among members of your organization.  Remember to document who is responsible for what and appoint a risk owner too.

          Documenting your risks is a good corporate practice and will be beneficial should you need historical data for future reference. You can analyze past mistakes and develop more effective solutions should there be a similar risk in the future.

            Monitor and Review

            The level of risks that your company is facing is constantly changing. New risks can emerge, while others become less critical.

            Make sure to regularly monitor your risk exposure so that you will be ready to take action should the need arise. If you regularly monitor your risks, you can prevent these risks from becoming a crisis for your organization.

            Having a risk management process in place is a smart move for any organization that values the importance of being prepared. Not only senior management and members of the risk management team must be conscious of the company’s risk exposure.

            You should also train your staff to be aware of potential risks so that they know what to look out for and how they can contribute towards risk management.

            Mia Clarke

            Mia Clarke is part of the content team at The Long Reach. Mia has worked in the Tech industry since graduating from university. When not researching and writing about the newest technologies, Mia can be found researching new travel locations.

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            Things You Can Do With Chatgpt

            OpenAI and ChatGPT are making news for various reasons. Folks are asking, will ChatGPT be an alternative to web search engines like Bing or Google? ChatGPT is a new invention from OpenAI. In this guide, we show you 10 things you can do with ChatGPT.

            Is ChatGPT an app?

            No, ChatGPT is not an app. It is a language generation model developed and released by OpenAI that you can use to generate text in a wide range of styles and formats. You can use ChatGPT in various methods including a web API or using other available libraries and frameworks that provide access to the model. ChatGPT can help you in generating text for a wide range of applications including chatbots, social media content, product descriptions, customer service replies, marketing copy, etc.

            Is ChatGPT free?

            Yes, ChatGPT is currently free-to-use. You can use it on the OpenAI website by creating an account using an email. There is no standalone application or website for ChatGPT. You have to use it on the OpenAI official website.

            Things you can do with ChatGPT

            If you know about ChatGPT and want to know what you can do with ChatGPT, the following tips are for you.

            Generate summaries of books you want to read

            Write a song with a description

            Write stories

            Generate jokes

            Write code

            Find mistakes in a code

            Get suggestions

            Play games

            Create a resume and cover letter

            Translate languages

            Let’s get into the details of each one.

            1] Generate summaries of books you want to read

            If you want to read a specific book and you don’t find time to complete reading it, you can use ChatGPT to generate a summary of the book you wanted to read. Just type Generate summary for a specific book and you will get a detailed summary. This tip can help you get summaries of many books and absorb the details of books that you can’t read otherwise for time or other constraints.

            Read: How to use ChatGPT?

            2] Write a song with a description

            If you are a musician or a lyric writer and want to get some inspiration or ideas as to write lyrics, you can ask ChatGPT to write a song or lyric on something you want to write. You can ask ChatGPT to write a song on anything. Once it is written, you can use it and improvise on it to make it a better song. We just asked ChatGPT to write a song on Windows 11 and it actually wrote a full song.

            3] Write stories

            Writers always get stuck at some point and cannot go further into the writing. Writers usually say it is writer’s block. ChatGPT can help you write stories and avoid those blocks. You can use ChatGPT to write any kind of story and you can write a better story based on the story written by ChatGPT on the subject you have given. All you need to do is just ask. You can pass time by generating stories and reading them based on your preferences. You can also mix 3-4 stories it generates and make a long story with twists and turns.

            4] Generate jokes

            If you have some spare time and want to play and learn new jokes, you can use ChatGPT to generate unique jokes you never heard of. All the jokes generated by ChatGPT might not be funny but you get to know some funny ones or you can improvise on its jokes to make them better. You can use these ChatGPT-generated jokes with your friends and have a few laughs with them.

            Read: Guide to OpenAI and its Products and Services

            5] Write code

            If you are a programmer or a coder and cannot write code or are stuck at some point, ChatGPT can help you write the code in any language. You can ask ChatGPT to write code in a particular programming language and use it in your programs. As always, you can better the code generated by ChatGPT. This way, you can also learn to code by seeing the code written on something by ChatGPT. It gives you some experience.

            TIP: AI Text Classifier tool can detect ChatGPT-generated content

            6] Find mistakes in a code

            If you have already written a code and it is not rendering as you expected it to be. Then, you need to find the bugs or errors in it and can’t go through 1000s of lines of code, you can ask ChatGPT to find the mistakes in your code and correct them. You can save a lot of time using ChatGPT to write and edit your code.

            Read: How to clear Bing Chat AI search history

            7] Get suggestions

            ChatGPT can also give you suggestions or tips on something you want to do. From suggestions on life to tips to lose weight, you can get any kind of suggestions for free. It can even suggest you a diet that can help you gain or lose weight based on your preferences. You need to be aware that it is an AI language model and following its suggestions might or might not help you. You need to be aware of that.

            8] Play games

            If you are bored at midnight or some other time and no friend is available to chat or talk, you can use ChatGPT to play games or even talk. It can be your friend based on the inputs you give. You can play any game you suggest on ChatGPT and pass some time.

            TIP: Take a look at these free ChatGPT alternatives too.

            9] Create a resume and cover letter

            Creating a good resume and a cover letter for a job has never been this easier. You can give inputs to ChatGPT on the position and all the details about it and ask to generate a resume or cover letter, it can do it for you in no time. You can use the generated cover letter and improvise it before applying to any position.

            Read: What is DALL·E 2? Explained for Beginners with examples

            10] Translate languages

            Using ChatGPT you can even translate languages. You need to input something in a language and ask it to translate it to some other language. You get the translation in the original language including the letters. If you are on a tour and Google is not helping you, you can use ChatGPT for translations if you have some time to search on it.

            These are the different ways you can use ChatGPT and get the most out of the service. You can use it on OpenAI official website.

            Related read: How to create realistic images using DALL-E-2 AI service

            Do You Need To Conduct A Cybersecurity Risk Assessment?

            Tip

            General security tips to keep your business safe include training your team on security best practices, keeping antivirus solutions updated, and enacting and enforcing security policies and procedures.

            How to do a cybersecurity risk assessment

            Cybersecurity threats constantly evolve as hackers find new ways to infiltrate companies’ IT networks. Cybersecurity experts recommend that businesses carry out at least one cybersecurity risk assessment yearly as part of their overall cybersecurity plan.

            Take the following four steps to protect your company:

            1. Gather information to begin the cybersecurity risk assessment.

            Cybersecurity risk assessments expose existing technical weaknesses across your IT network. However, you must have an in-depth working knowledge of your company’s hardware and software to spot them. You must also understand how to secure your business’s Wi-Fi network. 

            If you or your team don’t thoroughly understand your network setup, call in a cybersecurity expert to conduct the assessment.

            Whatever your cybersecurity risk assessment reveals, commit to making substantial system changes to remove all current vulnerabilities, despite any cost or disruption concerns.

            “If businesses don’t have the experience, the tools or the team to conduct a thorough and accurate risk assessment, and are just trying to save costs by doing it themselves, they can experience increased costs in the future when a hack or data breach that could have otherwise been prevented occurs,” said Keri Lindenmuth, marketing team lead for business services provider KDG. “Many small businesses don’t recover from a data breach because of the financial implications and end up closing their doors forever.”

            Tip

            To protect your business from a data breach, evaluate your security procedures, prioritize cloud security, and train all employees to follow data safety best practices.

            Did You Know?

            WPA2-Enterprise is considered the gold standard networking protocol for wireless security in the enterprise.

            Assess your website.

            If your website and company software are integrated, your customer records and other valuable data may be at heightened risk. It’s crucial to include your website in your cybersecurity risk assessment to protect that data.

            Common problems with websites include a lack of SSL/TLS certificates and HTTPS, which are factors in securing a domain. 

            Tip

            E-commerce website security best practices include working with a secure e-commerce platform, staying on top of SSL certificates, and using a virtual private network (VPN).

            Assess your apps and software.

            Software vendors regularly issue updates or patches designed to improve security in the following ways:

            Stopping new and emerging attacks

            Protecting against a newly discovered vulnerability or back door in their software

            Vendors only provide patches during their products’ lifetimes. Consider replacing software that’s no longer supported. Ensure all supported software on your system has the latest patches. Sign up for each vendor’s newsletter to receive details about forthcoming patches.

            FYI

            Consider investing in cybersecurity insurance coverage, including data breach and cyber liability insurance, to insure against losses from data breaches, ransomware and other cybersecurity threats.

            Did You Know?

            The best VPN services provide fast, secure connections while encrypting data. The intercepted data will be indecipherable even if a hacker infiltrates an employee’s device.

            4. Consider potential risks and their likelihood and impact.

            A truly secure network doesn’t connect to the internet. But that’s not a feasible option now. You must accept that there are risks in going online. In your cybersecurity risk assessment, consider the risk level you find acceptable.

            When you find a vulnerability, consider how hard it would be to defend yourself against an attack that exploits it. Determine the damage a hacker could do if they entered your network via that vulnerability.

            The importance of doing cybersecurity risk assessments

            Big businesses aren’t the only ventures under threat from cybercriminals – small businesses faced $2.98 million in data breach costs in 2023, according to IBM.

            In addition to costly risks from cyber attacks, some businesses must meet industry-specific cybersecurity compliance standards, such as HIPAA for healthcare businesses, FERPA for educational institutions, and PCI DSS for companies taking credit and debit card payments.

            It’s crucial for businesses to budget for cybersecurity. The financial and reputational damage incurred by losing company and customer data is significant and may lead to your business’s demise. 

            Andrew Martins contributed to the reporting and writing in this article. Some source interviews were conducted for a previous version of this article.

            6 Things Samsung Should Have Done To Improve The Galaxy Note 9

            Samsung Galaxy Note 9 is among us, the company’s ultimate smartphone of 2023. This is the device that is supposed to show the world why Samsung is the leading smartphone vendor and is here to compete with other top phones from the likes of Apple, Google, Huawei, LG, Sony, and so on.

            Does the Note 9 have what it takes to go against the best in the market? Definitely. Is it the best device on the market? It’s definitely up there. But is it the perfect phone or rather the perfect upgrade, especially for anyone coming from the Galaxy Note 8? Probably not!

            Samsung could have done more and considering it has the resources and finances to do so. With this in mind, here’s what we think Samsung could have done to make the Galaxy Note 9 even more exciting.

            Related: Galaxy Note 9: List of new, first time ever features

            Android Pie out of the box

            Related: Will we see Android Pie updates roll out as easy as pie?

            Better super slow-mo video recording

            One of the major USPs of the Galaxy S9 is the ability to record super slow-motion videos. While this is definitely a nifty addition to what is already an amazing camera, it’s not the best the market has. Where Sony’s Xperia XZ2 can record 1080p videos at 960fps, the S9 can only manage the same frame rate with 720p videos. However, the latter manages to capture double the amount of time the former captures, which is just 0.1 seconds.

            With the Galaxy Note 9, Samsung had the opportunity to better these figures from both the Galaxy S9 and Sony Xperia XZ2, but it didn’t. Instead, the Note 9 is getting the same slow-mo video recording capabilities as the S9, albeit with twice the recording time on the S9, which is kinda disappointing from Samsung.

            Related: Smartphones that support 960fps video recording

            Huawei P20 Pro-like colors

            Smartphone vendors have often used unique color variants to spur sales and we saw it with the Huawei P20 Pro, especially the Twilight color variant that gives different shades depending on the type of lighting you are in. Samsung Galaxy Note 9 has new color variants in Ocean Blue and Lavender Purple, but there’s nothing pretty much interesting about them other than them being, well, new color variants. The Note 9 could have done with a Twilight-like color finish if you ask us.

            Three camera lenses like the P20 Pro

            We know that the number of lenses or even megapixel count doesn’t necessarily affect the quality of photography, but the implementation. However, we saw all the hype that the Huawei P20 Pro got all because of donning three camera lenses on the back. In practice, the P20 Pro is a great photography companion, which also means that having three lenses can be a good thing.

            With the Note 9, Samsung has definitely missed out on the hype by sticking to the mainstream dual-lens camera setup that we see everywhere, including on the Galaxy Note 8, the phone it’s supposed to upgrade. Heck, it would have been even more interesting if the selfie camera got a second lens or even bumping it up to close to the 24MP used on the front of the Huawei P20 Pro.

            120Hz display for better gaming

            Although keeping it low-key, Samsung is also pushing the Galaxy Note 9 as a gaming device and given its massive 6.4-inch Super AMOLED display with a QHD+ resolution, a 4000mAh battery and up to 8 gigs of RAM, why not? The company says the Note 9 has a water-carbon cooling system meant to keep the device cool and in optimal performance during intensive gaming, but one thing that would have transformed the Note 9 into a deserved ROG Phone or Razer Phone alternative is the inclusion of a 120Hz refresh rate. Maybe we’ll see this in the next Note.

            Related: These Android games are optimized for 120Hz display screens

            Lower price point

            The Galaxy Note 9 is a good phone, but is it worth 1000 bucks? That’s up for debate and from this side of the table, the debate rages on. Anyone coming from the Galaxy Note 8 will probably feel cheated upon spending this amount on the Note 9 only to get the same design, just about the same display screen, a bigger battery, powered S Pen, variable aperture, super slow-motion video recording, USB-C DeX support alongside camera tricks and a Bixby upgrade that will eventually end up on the Note 8 via software updates. If anything, it would have been a welcome idea if Samsung repeated what it did with the Galaxy S9 vs S8 by sticking to the same price tag as the Note 8, which came valued at $929.

            Related: Where to buy the Galaxy Note 9 (India, USA, UK, and Europe)

            Despite all the rants, we’ll at some point have to agree the Galaxy Note 9 is a great phone. In fact, it’s easily the best there is on the market right now. However, the decision of buying one will eventually rest with you, depending on how deep you are willing and able to dig into your pockets.

            What do you think?

            Project And Program Risk Management

            For a project-oriented organization, the success of a project is key to the company’s success. Completing the project with minimal resources, a skilled workforce, and the allotted budget are a few things that help a company achieve its organizational goals. And while schedule, cost, deadlines, resources, and budget are all crucial for success, the biggest and more important factor that can be the difference between the success and failure of a project is risk.

            Every project, irrespective of its size and nature, carries some form of risk. It might vary depending on the type of project you are working on. The risk might also change based on how your project progresses. It’s important that you monitor the risk throughout the project lifecycle. Some risks bring new opportunities for the company, while others are a threat that might lead to negative consequences. Identifying the risks, evaluating them based on the potential consequences, and, most importantly, establishing the ways to mitigate those risks is important in ensuring the successful completion of different projects.

            What is Project Risk?

            Risks are uncertainty. As mentioned above, you can only guess whether a certain risk has a positive or negative impact on your organization. This also allows you to better equip yourself with the tools needed to deal with risks when they crop up in the middle of the project. Remember, the risk affects one or more of your project objectives. You need to evaluate the risk beforehand to understand better whether it’s worth taking the risk or if you should just leave the part that has any chance of leading to negative consequences.

            Usually, managers work with stakeholders and their teams to make a risk management plan. The first step in mitigating any kind of risk is developing a risk management plan. You need to document each step you should take to reduce the risk or deal with it as efficiently as possible. Risk management, basically, refers to the process of handling the risk such that your end result sare not affected. Simply put, risk management is the process of identifying, evaluating, and mitigating risks through a series of steps.

            Project Risk Management Steps

            These six steps will help you plan risk management proactively so that when something uncertain occurs, you know how to handle that.

            Risk Identification

            The first step in risk management is to identify potential risks that can have positive or negative consequences on your project outcome. Talking to your team and conducting regular meetings with stakeholders and supervisors will help you understand the risks that might occur.

            For example, when you are working on a project with a tight deadline, there is a risk of delaying the delivery because of the national holidays. You can create a list of project risks based on previous projects. Work with your team to figure out all things that can go wrong or might affect your project’s outcome. It’s best to use your intuition to avoid missing out on anything.

            Risk Analysis

            Risk analysis is pretty complex. You need to gather information about the project, evaluate the past project to get a better understanding of what may cause problems in executing the existing project, and work with your team at all steps.

            Certain risks, like violating your state’s legal requirements or corporate laws, can result in the termination of the project and a hefty penalty. Even worse, these issues can shut your company down permanently. That’s why identification and analysis of such risks before starting a project are critical. You can use quantitative and qualitative risk analysis to determine the impact the risk has on your business.

            Prioritize Risks

            Prioritizing risks requires gathering information about the level of impact a risk can have on your project or the organization as a whole. These steps involve risk classification as — low, medium, and high. It’s easier to decide on the actions you can take if these risks occur and the resources you are going to need to address them.

            Some risks require immediate addressing, or they will impact the success of the project. Some risks might affect your work schedule but don’t necessarily pose a big threat to your project outcome. Some risks have no impact on your project’s success at all. While these are critical, you already have the resources and plan to deal with them. These can be categorized as low-priority risks.

            Assign Risks to Your Team

            Once you have created the list of potential risks, assign them to your team. Each employee should be assigned a particular risk based on their area of specialization and their involvement in the project. This reduces the manager’s burden. You can have peace of mind knowing that when a risk occurs, your team will take care of it and address the problem the way you had planned. You can also create a team for risk management. This team will handle all sorts of risks in all projects.

            Creating a Risk Management Strategy

            The next step is identifying whether the risk will have a positive or negative impact on the project outcome. Based on this, you need to come up with a risk mitigation strategy. You must work with your stakeholders to create a strong risk management strategy that helps you handle small to complex risks effectively and ensure that they don’t impact your organizational objectives.

            Monitoring the Risk

            Your job doesn’t end with creating a risk mitigation strategy. While that’s pretty much all that you need to manage stress and address them as and when required, you never know if your strategy will be effective as your project progresses. There’s always a chance you might face different risks when you start working on a project. When implementing a risk mitigation strategy, you need to monitor its progress throughout the project’s lifecycle and develop new risk management plans when necessary.

            A transparent risk management process where your entire team knows the project status and the risks it presents will help you deal with the project risks efficiently. Follow the above six steps to implement the best risk management strategy for future projects.

            5 Things You Need To Know About So

            Update 8/19/2023: At the time this post was written, the so-called “female Viagra” was recommended for approval by the FDA. On August 18, 2023, the FDA officially approved the drug.

            It’s the third time this incarnation of what’s being touted in the media as female Viagra has been brought before the FDA for approval. The agency hit the brakes on flibanserin in 2010 and again in 2013, saying its modest benefits didn’t outweigh the risks. This time around, Sprout Pharmaceuticals was betting on new safety data to tip the scales in their direction. They were right.

            We talked to several experts to find out more about the search for a libido drug for women—specifically, why it took so long to get one. Here’s what we learned.

            “Female Viagra” Is a Misnomer

            Viagra helps performance. Women want a pill for desire. Pfizer, the makers of Viagra, gave up on women way back in 2004. The little blue pill helps increase blood flow to the penis when a man is aroused. In studies, this functional approach did squat for women with low desire. (A small Pfizer-funded study did show a benefit of Viagra for women on antidepressants.) Since then, pharmaceutical companies interested in this segment have been focusing on hormones and brain chemicals that affect female desire.

            The Target is Called Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder

            HSDD is the most common female sexual dysfunction—affecting up to a fifth of women—and it’s what drug companies have been going after. “This is not a made-up condition,” says Lauren Streicher, MD, associate professor of clinical obstetrics and gynecology at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. “Women who have HSDD don’t have fantasies and they don’t desire sex. We know that there’s a hormonal component, and it’s also mediated by neurotransmitters, specifically dopamine and serotonin, and the way that they act in the frontal cortex.” The most recent edition of Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the DSM-5, which came out in 2013, changed things around, and HSDD is no longer a standalone diagnosis. Now it’s part of a new condition, female sexual interest/arousal disorder (FSIAD). The idea is the same though: It has to be ongoing and cause distress, and it can’t be directly caused by a non-sexual mental disorder, severe relationship distress (like abuse) or other stressors or a drug or other medical condition.

            Low Desire Is a Complicated Thing

            There’s some debate over whether a drug can actually help restore female desire. Unsurprisingly, there are many factors at play when it comes to women and desire, including relationship issues, boredom and discomfort during sex (something that becomes increasingly common after menopause, but can often be treated). “Too often, female sexual desire gets medicalized,” says Washington, D.C.-based psychotherapist and neuropsychologist Marsha Lucas, PhD, author of Rewire Your Brain for Love. “There’s a time and place for it, just like antidepressants—but just like [with] antidepressants, it’s often not a pharmacological ‘cure’ that’s really needed.” Streicher says flibanserin helps a very specific category of woman: “The right candidate is someone that used to have a great libido, but no longer has a great libido and there’s no other explanation for it. She’s in a loving relationship and she’s stopped having sexy thoughts, and—most importantly—she’s distressed by it and she wants to do something about it.”

            Flibanserin Isn’t an Antidepressant, but It Works on Neurotransmitter Receptors

            Flibanserin was first developed as an antidepressant. The original manufacturer, Boehringer Ingelheim, shifted gears after noticing that women taking it in studies started having more sexual thoughts. (Boehringer Ingelheim sold flibanserin to Sprout Pharmaceuticals after the FDA’s first review.) “It’s similar to an SSRI in that it works on neurotransmitter receptors in the brain and is thought to correct an imbalance in neurotransmitters,” explains Sheryl Kingsberg, PhD, division chief of ob-gyn behavioral medicine at University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland and a consultant for Sprout. “However, while SSRIs promote serotonin release, which can dampen desire, flibanserin likely promotes dopamine release.” If approved, the drug will be marketed under the name Addyi and will come as a 100-milligram pill to be taken every night at bedtime.

            The Best Libido Drug for Women Is Probably Testosterone, but Don’t Expect the FDA to Approve It Anytime Soon

            Low desire is more common after menopause. Again, there are many reasons for this (symptoms of menopause such as hot flashes, sleep deprivation and a bone-dry vagina don’t exactly put you in the mood), but declining testosterone levels are believed to be an important factor. The FDA turned down Proctor & Gamble’s testosterone patch for women in 2004, the same year Pfizer gave up on female Viagra. “The FDA was concerned that if the patch was given to a large number of menopausal women, theoretically it might increase the risk of breast cancer and heart attacks,” says James Simon, professor of obstetrics and gynecology at The George Washington University School of Medicine and lead investigator for flibanserin clinical trials. Simon also worked on the testosterone patch and gel.

            In 2011, BioSante’s testosterone gel failed to show a statistically significant difference in terms of the number of sexually satisfying events from placebo, something Simon and others say is a poor measure of desire in women. Will a flibanserin victory open the door for testosterone treatments for HSDD? Not necessarily, Simon says: “Even if flibanserin gets approved, I still have my doubts about testosterone because the FDA still seems to be overly concerned about the two safety endpoints that they were concerned about in 2004.”

            There’s plenty of data showing that very low-dose testosterone is safe and effective for postmenopausal women. Both Streicher and Mary Jane Minkin, MD, a clinical professor of obstetrics, gynecology, and reproductive sciences at Yale School of Medicine, said that many ob-gyns prescribe low-dose testosterone off-label for postmenopausal women with good results. Unfortunately, these prescriptions are filled at compounding pharmacies, which aren’t FDA-regulated and aren’t covered by insurance. “I wish I could get testosterone for my ladies,” Minkin says.

            For that, we’ll likely be waiting a while longer.

            Jennifer Abbasi is a Portland, OR-based freelance writer. Follow her on Twitter at @jenabbasi.

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