High blood pressure is not just bad for your heart—it may also be hurting your love life. According to a new study presented at the American Society of Hypertension’s 21st Annual Scientific Meeting in New York City, women with high blood pressure (hypertension) are twice as likely to experience sexual dysfunction as women with normal blood pressure.

Female sexual dysfunction (FSD) is a complex condition that may include flagging or absent sexual desire or arousal, pain during sex or trouble achieving orgasm. While much of the research on sexual dysfunction was focused on men, the condition is actually more common in women. Results from the US National Health and Social Life Survey show 43 percent of women experienced sexual dysfunction, compared to 31 percent of men.

“Since FSD greatly affects patients and their sexual partners’ quality of life, it seems of great importance to properly recognize and manage FSD in hypertensive women,” said lead author Michael Doumas, M.D. of the University of Athens, Greece.

Dr. Doumas and his fellow researchers had 417 sexually active women between the ages of 31 and 60 fill out a survey to determine the health of their sex lives. Half of the women taking the survey had high blood pressure, while the other half did not. The study was conducted in Greece.

The results show 42 percent of the women with hypertension also had FSD, compared to only 19 percent of the women without hypertension. Fortunately, high blood pressure does not doom a woman to years of sexual dissatisfaction. Those who took medication to control their hypertension had far fewer sexual problems than women whose hypertension was untreated (27 percent versus 52 percent, respectively).

The study also found that the longer a woman lives with hypertension, the greater her chances are of developing FSD. Among women who had hypertension for less than three years, only about 16 percent had FSD, but for those who had lived with hypertension for 3-6 years, 33 percent experienced FSD. An alarming 79 percent of women with hypertension for more than six years had FSD.

While it is important for women to seek help for their sexual troubles, Dr. Doumas called on doctors to do a better job of screening for this problem in women with high blood pressure. “Internists and general practitioners are in a unique position to properly recognize FSD and help women facing their intimate problems,” Dr. Doumas concluded. “Quality of life is very important to overall health, thus it is of utmost importance for internists and general practitioners to become familiar with FSD and routinely address it with their hypertensive patients.”