Dr. Jonathan Schaffir, an obstetrician and gynecologist with the medical center, was prompted to carry out the study after results indicated that many women become bloated, feel breast tenderness or experience nausea after taking the pill.
The early forms of the pill developed in the 1960s, which often contained high levels of estrogens and progestin as much as 80 to 150 micrograms in single doses, which often caused the side effects.
According to ANI reports, Schaffir said, "These side effects could easily have caused women to feel extremely uncomfortable, translating into decreased libido.
He continued, "Also much less was known about the human sexual response at that time, which could have led to information based on opinion and not on fact."
Schaffir said that many women, who experienced a change in libido while taking oral contraceptives, experienced it due to androgens - the precursor of all estrogens, or the female sex hormones. The primary and most well-known androgen is testosterone.
"It was shown that the birth control pill decreased the concentration of free androgens, including testosterone, but that doesn't necessarily translate to a loss of libido. Chemical changes occurred, but they did not apparently impact sexual behavior for the vast majority of women," he said.
The research also shows that a small dose of progestin too affects women's sexual desire by decreasing it to certain extent. The research concluded that only a small minority of oral contraceptive users experienced a negative effect on sexuality.
"The available literature illustrated that decreased libido is an idiosyncratic, unpredictable reaction in a small minority of women," Schaffir concluded adding that women should continue to use oral contraceptives without fear of an adverse effect on libido.
