6 Tips for a Healthier Penis

​Poor penis health can lead to stress, anxiety, depression, relationship problems, difficulty with sex and self-confidence issues. In some cases, issues involving the penis can be a sign of other serious health conditions, such as heart disease or diabetes.

Given all that, keeping your penis healthy should be a no-brainer. But how? Six easy-to-implement suggestions for just such an outcome follow.

1. Exercise regularly

Maintaining a regular exercise schedule can help improve penis health and reduce your chances of experiencing sexual dysfunction. You don’t have to go overboard, either. Research has shown that exercising even moderately for 30 minutes a day five times each week can lead to a variety of health benefits. In fact, one Harvard study found that men who ran for 90 minutes or did three hours of vigorous outdoor work each week were 20 percent less likely to develop erectile dysfunction than those who did not exercise at all.

2. Eat healthy foods

Eating well isn’t only important for your overall health, it’s also critical for your penis. Natural whole foods like fruits, vegetables, nuts and legumes help prevent the buildup of plaque deposits in blood vessels that can cause reduced blood flow to the penis. And that leads to firmer erections.

Eating meals high in calories and low in nutrients can cause clogged arteries, which have been shown to adversely impact sexual function. In addition, some medical experts believe foods such as spinach, tuna, shellfish, avocado and egg yolks may increase testosterone levels and improve fertility.

3. Have sex or masturbate regularly

This one may be unexpected, but as it turns out, men who engage in regular sexual activity have been found to have fewer instances of erectile dysfunction (ED). In addition, researchers at Harvard found that more frequent ejaculation may be connected to a reduced risk of developing prostate cancer, though the reasons for this are still unclear. Another study, published in the American Journal of Medicine, found that men between the ages of 55 and 75 could decrease their risk of erectile dysfunction by having sex at least once per week.

4. Get a good night’s sleep

Sleep deprivation has been linked to a host of health problems that lead to sexual complications as we age, including high blood pressure, diabetes and sleep apnea. A study in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that young and healthy men who got less than five hours of sleep per night for a week experienced a 10 to 15 percent drop in their testosterone count. Some experts believe that inadequate sleep could lead to higher chances of ED in men.

5. Practice good hygiene

Gently wash your penis with soap and warm water whenever you take a shower. This is especially important for men who are uncircumcised. Bad hygiene can lead to a buildup of a cheesy-looking substance called smegma below the foreskin. However, even with a circumcised penis, bad hygiene can lead to inflammation, irritation or a condition called balanitis, which involves redness and swelling of the head of the penis.

6. Quit smoking

Add the health of your penis to the growing number of reasons to stop smoking. Nicotine from cigarettes makes your blood vessels contract, which can stifle blood flow to your penis. Smoking also damages arteries, which decreases the amount of oxygen that reaches the penis. This leads to lowered levels of nitric oxide in the blood, a chemical that is necessary for erections.

According to research published in BJUI International, quitting smoking can lead to faster and firmer erections. In the study, nearly one-third of the participants who stopped smoking had fuller erections than when they smoked, while 75 percent of those who quit who had previously struggled with erectile dysfunction were better able to achieve and maintain erections.

Implementing these simple and practical steps into your everyday life can help you better achieve and maintain penis health.