Two relatively new drug subscription services have entered the market and offer a limited line of brand-name and generic erectile dysfunction medications.  How do they measure up?  

Introduction

Hims and Roman, two online marketers of men’s health medications — most notably erectile dysfunction drugs — were founded on the realization that men generally are hesitant to discuss intimate matters with their doctors. On top of that, many men avoid doctors no matter what their health problems might be.

To reach that reluctant male consumer, both Hims (ForHims.com) and Roman (GetRoman.com) invite men with symptoms of ED or other sensitive health problems to take advantage of low-cost online consultations with licensed U.S. doctors to determine if ED drugs are appropriate for them.

This novel form of telemedicine is hardly new and has been available for years from eDrugstore.com, which has been in business since the late 1990s. Such services allow men reluctant to discuss their sex lives face to face with their regular doctors to broach these matters online in a less embarrassing manner. However, they all stress the need for their customers to keep their regular doctors apprised of any medication changes they may make.

What They Have in Common

Although both Hims and Roman, as well as eDrugstore.com, headline ED drugs as their primary products, all three services also stock a variety of other lifestyle medications and products. These include hair-loss treatments; antiviral drugs to combat cold sores, genital herpes, and other infections caused by the herpes simplex viruses 1 and 2; and vitamins; as well as skin care and smoking cessation products.

However, Hims and Roman differ dramatically from eDrugstore in that they are basically subscription services. If you place an initial order for a month’s or quarter’s supply of Sildenafil Citrate, the active ingredient in Viagra, you then will automatically receive monthly or quarterly shipments until you cancel your subscription.

ED Drug Options at Hims

The basic ED treatment starting package at Hims consists of 10 20-milligram tablets of sildenafil citrate. To approximate the recommended starting dose of 50 milligrams for this drug, you would need two to three 20-milligram tablets, equivalent to 40 or 60 milligrams. The 20-milligram tablets of sildenafil are the Generic equivalent of another Pfizer drug known as Revatio, which is prescribed for the treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension, or PAH. However, this is the same drug as that found in Viagra, only at a smaller dose. Hims’ monthly tab for this basic package is $30. The manufacturer of this generic sildenafil citrate is not identified at the ForHims website.

Alternatively, customers can opt for brand-name Viagra or low-dose tadalafil, the generic equivalent of daily Cialis, which is taken daily to ensure the consumer is ready for sexual activity whenever the time is right. Hims’ monthly prices for brand-name Viagra and daily tadalafil are $425 and $240, respectively. The monthly tadalafil package includes 30 pills as this medication must be taken daily to achieve its advertised goal. The brand-name Viagra package consists of five 50-milligram tablets monthly.

ED Drug Options at Roman

Over at GetRoman.com, the prospective customer is asked to select his intended number of uses per month, ranging from 4 to 10 times a month. He then must select his drug of choice from the following options: sildenafil citrate (generic Viagra), brand-name Viagra, tadalafil (generic Cialis) and brand-name Cialis. Next comes a choice of preferred dosage strength. For sildenafil citrate, the starting dosage strength is 50 milligrams, which is priced at $34 per dose, while the starting dose for branded Viagra is also 50 milligrams, priced by Roman at $70 per dose. Tadalafil is available for $44 per dose, compared with $69 per dose of brand-name Cialis.

Both the generic and brand-name Cialis available from Roman are higher strength forms of the drug, the effects of which in ideal circumstances can last for up to 36 hours. By contrast, the effects of sildenafil citrate and Viagra usually last four to six hours. Also available from Roman is daily Cialis, which consists of 30 5-milligram doses that must be taken every day. Roman’s monthly tab for daily Cialis is roughly $13 per tablet, or $390 per month.

As at Hims, Roman’s generic ED drugs are not identified by manufacturer.

ED Drug Options at eDrugstore

Based in Tempe, Arizona, eDrugstore.com has been in business for more than two decades. It sells the full range of ED medications, including all brand-name and generic products, that have been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for sale in the United States. Brand-name ED drugs include Viagra, Cialis, Levitra, Staxyn, and Stendra. Also available are two generic alternatives to Viagra, and one each for Cialis and Levitra. The generic Viagra equivalents are manufactured by Teva USA and Greenstone LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Pfizer, which developed Viagra back in the 1990s. The generic alternative to Cialis is produced by Prasco, while the generic Levitra is manufactured by Zygus USA.

Because these ED medications and several other lifestyle drugs sold by eDrugstore are available only by prescription, eDrugstore offers complimentary online consultations with licensed U.S. physicians to customers who don’t yet have a prescription. These consultations save a significant amount of both time and money. With all first orders, eDrugstore includes a free pill splitter, which can help consumers save even further.

Unlike Hims and Roman, eDrugstore has no subscription plans, so customers can order as many or as few doses of its available drugs as they expect to use in the near future.

Bottom Line

As previously noted, both Hims and Roman are subscription plans, available on a monthly or quarterly basis. Those who opt for the quarterly shipments can realize a slight savings over the monthly subscription. In both cases, these subscription plans can be canceled at any time.

With eDrugstore, each purchase stands on its own and doesn’t involve buying into a continuing shipment program.

When it comes to product selection among ED drugs, eDrugstore has both Hims and Roman beat with the broadest selection of medications by far. Price per dose for brand-name Viagra and Cialis differs little between the three vendors. However, Hims’ and Roman’s basic packages of sildenafil citrate in 20-milligram tablets are not available from eDrugstore. As noted earlier, 20-milligram sildenafil tablets are considered the generic equivalent of Revatio, a drug prescribed to treat PAH, a form of high blood pressure that targets the lungs and puts an extra strain on the heart. However, multiple 20-milligram tablets of sildenafil can approximate a typical dose of Viagra since these drugs differ only in dosage size and not in chemical composition.

To learn more about the full range of ED drugs available from eDrugstore, pay a visit to its Erectile Dysfunction page.