BlueChew Gold Review

It’s no secret that erectile dysfunction (ED) is incredibly widespread, with a third of all men affected at some point in their lives.1 The bright side of that fact is that the market demand for safe, effective ED medications has given way to medications like Viagra and Cialis, which have great success rates.

But as effective as these medications are for many men, plenty of users find they’re insufficient on their own, in which case their doctors may have them combine medications to attain better results.2 Finding the ideal combination of therapies can be a long journey, but BlueChew aims to take the guesswork out of the process by combining the generic forms of Viagra and Cialis with two other drugs that tackle ED in totally different ways.

The result is BlueChew Gold, which leverages PDE5 inhibitors, a dopamine agonist, and oxytocin (a.k.a. “the love hormone”) to improve both performance and desire. Could this potent combination be the last and most effective step for men with treatment-resistant ED? In this review, we’ll thoroughly explore the pros and cons.

BlueChew Gold is the only combination ED medication on the market to combine PDE5 inhibitors with an added ingredient to focus on mental health. Psychogenic ED — dysfunction borne from things like depression or anxiety — accounts for around 40% of ED cases, so by offering men the improved blood flow of traditional ED meds alongside oxytocin, Gold is a rare treatment choice for men whose ED might not have a physiological origin.3 It’s pricier than monotherapies but actually costs the same as or less than comparable combination therapies from competitors like Rugiet.

At Innerbody Research, we thoroughly evaluate all of the products and services we review, including BlueChew Gold. We’ve racked up more than 5,000 hours covering BlueChew and its competitors in the ED space, poring over the long history of research into various ED medications and monitoring the market landscape for changes over the years.

For this review, specifically, we dedicated another 100+ hours to discovering how the specific drug combination offered in BlueChew Gold might outperform simpler combinations and monotherapies in the company’s lineup and across the ED treatment space. We also ordered Gold for ourselves so we could continue to scrutinize all aspects of BlueChew’s customer service and compare the taste of this product to the company’s other chewables.

Additionally, like all health-related content on this website, this guide was thoroughly vetted by one or more members of our Medical Review Board for accuracy and will continue to be monitored for updates by our editorial team.

Over the past two decades, Innerbody Research has helped tens of millions of readers make more informed decisions about staying healthy and living healthier lifestyles.

Comparing BlueChew Gold to standard ED medications isn’t exactly fair. For one thing, standard medications — containing just one drug — are understandably much less expensive. For another, the men who have success with such monotherapies won’t have much reason to reach for more complex formulas like Gold offers. But men who struggle to find success with monotherapies could find relief from combinations.

So, while we applied a similar set of criteria to Gold as we would most other chewable ED medications — namely, effectiveness, safety, cost, convenience, and taste — we mostly scored the product in comparison with a pair of other, somewhat similar combination products: Rugiet Ready and Peaks Curative Triple Threat Melts. Peaks Curative was given far less consideration than Rugiet because, at this time, it only ships to half of the states in the U.S.

Let’s take a closer look at each criterion to see how BlueChew fares in this comparison.

Effectiveness

Effectiveness is undeniably BlueChew Gold’s strongest feature, as it offers a combination of drugs that no other ED medication can boast. Specifically, it contains:

• Sildenafil, generic for the PDE5 inhibitor Viagra
• Tadalafil, generic for the PDE5 inhibitor Cialis
• Apomorphine, a dopaminergic agonist
• Oxytocin, a hormone related to love, connection, and sexual desire

By comparison, Rugiet Ready and Peaks Curative contain the first three ingredients but exclude oxytocin. In all fairness, oxytocin is the one ingredient of Gold’s four that boasts the least amount of clinical research showing any actual effect in cases of ED. Its action is more theoretical on the physiological side, shown occasionally in animal studies, but not in human clinical research.4

But research indicates up to 40% of ED cases are psychogenic, meaning they stem from issues in the brain and mood, not issues in the body, like the blood flow problems underlying ED that PDE5 inhibitors so successfully treat.3 And even men who suffer from organic, blood flow–related ED still experience negative impacts on their mental health, which often exacerbate the problem.31

This is the angle from which oxytocin might make a difference, as it’s been studied in cases of anxiety and depression far more than in cases of ED.5 That research reveals a significant positive impact on mood and mental health that could translate to improved sexual performance in men with psychogenic ED or ED that negatively affects their mental health.

​Without this added ingredient, competing combinations may miss the core problem for at least 40% of men struggling with ED.

Safety

BlueChew Gold isn’t going to be the place most men new to ED meds will start their journey. Most prescribing physicians are more likely to start them off with a monotherapy, as single-drug treatments like sildenafil and tadalafil have proven very effective for most men with ED.6 7 Adding more medication to the picture could, at least in theory, increase side effect risks.

That said, there’s some evidence that combination ED therapies are not only more effective than monotherapies but also don’t increase side effect risk to a level of statistical significance.8 The problem with the research behind that claim is that it applies only to a combination of sildenafil and tadalafil, without considering the addition of non-PDE5 inhibitor drugs such as the apomorphine and oxytocin found in BlueChew Gold.

Fortunately, both apomorphine and oxytocin have relatively minimal side effect profiles of their own, so the overall risk, especially at the doses provided in Gold, should be low.9 10 And since Gold comes in three strengths, and you’ll decide on an approach through consulting with a BlueChew-affiliated physician who’ll oversee your progress on the medication, you can rest assured that you’ll land on the treatment and dosage that suits your needs best.

It’s also worth noting that, at this time, BlueChew Gold is only available with sildenafil and not vardenafil, a similar medication available elsewhere through BlueChew. Vardenafil is an option for the low percentage of men who experience a specific vision-related side effect from sildenafil, which we’ll discuss at greater length in our safety section later. But not having it as an option for BlueChew Gold excludes men who might experience this side effect of sildenafil, reducing the score slightly for this criterion.

Cost

When we talk about cost in these pieces, we try to separate it from our assessment of value, which takes into account the other criteria in this section and feeds into our overall rating. From a pure cost perspective, combination ED therapies are always going to be inferior to monotherapies. They contain more drugs, so they cost more.

That puts a slight ding in Gold’s cost score. But when we compare Gold’s cost to that of its nearest competitor in Rugiet Ready, we see that Gold either matches or beats Rugiet’s pricing at every dose and every quantity.

Here’s a quick chart to break it down for you:

As you can see, when we compare the lowest costs achieved by maximizing order size and billing frequency with both companies, BlueChew’s base dose offers a better price and a higher dose of sildenafil, while its high and extra doses offer the same deal but with a higher amount of either sildenafil or apomorphine. And every one of those BlueChew doses contains oxytocin, which Rugiet Ready lacks.

Convenience

While efficacy is Gold’s strongest criterion, convenience is a close second, thanks to the fact that you get four medications targeting ED from different angles packaged into a single, individually wrapped tablet. You can chew that tablet if you please, or you can let it dissolve under your tongue for an even faster onset of action. That’s because BlueChew has formulated its Gold and MAX chewables to pass their drugs through oral membranes, allowing them to reach the bloodstream without having to be digested first.11

By comparison, Rugiet Ready is a lozenge that you also hold under your tongue, but that isn’t nearly as chewable if that’s the method you prefer. Our testing also revealed that BlueChew’s tablets dissolve more quickly than Rugiet’s lozenges. That can be important if you’re in the middle of foreplay or otherwise pressed for time that you don’t want to spend with your mouth otherwise occupied.

Ultimately, the combination of medications and the ability to choose how you want to take it make Gold the most convenient combination therapy for ED on the market.

Taste

If there’s one drawback to BlueChew’s approach, it’s taste. The tablets don’t taste bad, per se, they just have a bit of a medicinal flavor to them. To be clear, they are flavored to taste something like a blue Smartie or SweeTart, if you’re familiar with those candies. And that taste is present. Each of our testers experienced it.

But the sweet taste exists alongside a medicinal one that it neither covers up nor complements. You end up with a flavor that is sweet and a hair sour and a flavor that is medicinal and bitter happening at the same time in your mouth. It’s not entirely unpleasant, especially if, like one of our testers, you like medicinal flavors (e.g., in certain cocktails). But we suspect most people will be slightly put off by the flavor and may want to chew a little gum or take a mint afterward, especially for their partner’s sake.

BlueChew Gold is a chewable/dissolvable tablet containing four medications intended to help men treat their ED. It’s available from BlueChew by prescription only. BlueChew provides its customers with end-to-end service, starting with product information and leading to a medical questionnaire and consultation with a physician, physician's assistant, or nurse practitioner. That medical professional will grant you a prescription for Gold or another BlueChew product if you’re eligible.

Inside Gold are four medications:

• Sildenafil
• Tadalafil
• Apomorphine
• Oxytocin

The first two of these drugs work to improve blood flow to the penis in response to stimuli.12 The third interacts with dopamine centers in the brain to improve your response to those stimuli. The fourth can improve mood, lift depression, and soothe anxiety.9 5 Taken together, they should be able to overcome most of the problems men face that lead to ED, whether physical or psychological.

BlueChew company reputation

BlueChew maintains an A+ rating from the Better Business Bureau (BBB), though the customer ratings on that website are far lower, sitting at just a 1.19 out of a possible 5 stars. It’s hard to draw firm conclusions here, as there are only 26 reviews generating this average. A deep dive into negative reviews and customer complaints reveals that the majority relate to billing issues and difficulty canceling automatic shipments, resulting in users being charged when they’d rather not be.

We can understand that this is frustrating, but we’ve also dealt with BlueChew for years, starting and stopping shipments for just about every product it’s ever made, and we’ve had nothing but success when suspending or canceling such shipments. (You can read more about our experiences as well as other customer reviews in our full BlueChew review.)

The picture on Trustpilot better reflects our experience with the company, where it maintains a rating of 4 out of 5 stars. Here, negative reviews are split between similar billing issues as those seen on BBB and users finding the medication ineffective. There’s no additional info in those reviews to indicate whether those customers increased their dose or moved on to trying combination therapies, but it’s true that ED monotherapies aren’t effective in 100% of cases.

This all paints a picture of a company with a solid online reputation and occasional technical issues on the billing side that we have yet to experience.

BlueChew Gold works by reaching beyond the bloodflow-related effects of common ED medications, like Viagra and Cialis, and including two additional novel treatments that target ED through different mechanisms. Below, we explore each of these medications to determine either how they’ve been proven to help men with ED or how the research behind them indicates they should help with ED, given everything we know about the issue.

We’ll start with the generic versions of Viagra and Cialis, after which we’ll discuss apomorphine and oxytocin as ancillary therapies that could make BlueChew Gold the right choice for you.

Sildenafil

Sildenafil is the active ingredient in Viagra, which has been a frontline treatment for ED for nearly 30 years. It’s designed to inhibit the action of phosphodiesterase-5 (PDE5), an enzyme responsible for degrading a compound called cGMP.13 cGMP builds up in response to sexual stimuli, resulting in increased blood flow to the penis. By preventing normal cGMP degradation, PDE5 inhibitors prime the system to create an erection in response to a stimulus. In most cases, the amount of PDE5 produced shortly after climax is sufficient to overcome the action of a PDE5 inhibitor, allowing an erection to subside normally after intercourse.

The first major study on its effectiveness, dating back to 1998, revealed that around 69% of attempts at intercourse for men with mild to moderate ED were successful after a single sildenafil dose, compared to just 22% with a placebo.14 Pooled analysis of a handful of 12-week follow-up studies saw up to 87% of patients reporting improved erections.6

So, for many men, sildenafil is plenty effective to improve their ED and sex lives. But it’s important to understand sildenafil’s time to onset and duration of action, as they differ significantly from tadalafil. Sildenafil takes about the same amount of time to start working as tadalafil (around 30-60 minutes), but it only lasts for 6-8 hours.15 By comparison, as we’ll discuss in a moment, tadalafil can last for more than 24 hours.7 Tadalafil can also be taken daily, whereas sildenafil is strictly an as-needed medication when taken for ED.

Tadalafil

Tadalafil is the other PDE5 inhibitor in BlueChew Gold, and while it works similarly to sildenafil, its duration of action and collateral inhibition of other PDE enzymes are quite different. Specifically, for most men, tadalafil works for 18-36 hours, which is much more convenient if you’re anticipating the need for erectile assistance but not completely sure when it will arise.7 You don’t have to worry as much about dose timing, and you can enjoy the duration of the evening — however long it might last — without concern about taking a second dose.

This added convenience is why a survey study of men and their partners using either sildenafil or tadalafil revealed a significant preference for tadalafil over sildenafil.16 As an added convenience, tadalafil has been shown to work as a daily medication, often at slightly lower doses than the as-needed variety. That allows men to take it consistently without worrying about remembering to take it or to bring it with them when they might need it.

Apomorphine

Apomorphine is a dopaminergic agonist that has often been studied in cases of Parkinson's disease. Rather than affecting blood flow like a PDE5 inhibitor, apomorphine impacts dopamine receptors in the brain, one of which has been linked with erectile performance.17 It has been shown to be effective in large clinical trials at a dose range of 2-6mg, with 3mg and 4mg doses proving the most effective.18

Additional research to corroborate these findings and establish how apomorphine might interact with PDE5 inhibitors would be welcome, but it has not yet been conducted.

It’s important to note that apomorphine isn’t directly related to morphine in any meaningful way. There are no similar withdrawal symptoms or addiction risks.

Oxytocin

Oxytocin is a hormone produced in instances of social bonding, not least of all during courtship and early parenting, earning it the nickname “the love hormone.”19 Of the four medications in Gold, oxytocin has the least amount of research looking at its impacts on erectile health. That said, it also has the most amount of research looking at its role in mental health, which turns out to be a major driver of ED.

In fact, up to 40% of ED cases have been shown to be psychogenic in origin, which is to say that they’re rooted in things like depression or anxiety.3 Add to that the number of men who suffer impacts to their mental health as a result of organic ED (i.e., ED from blood flow problems or other physiological issues), and it becomes immediately clear that medication to improve mental health can make a significant difference for men with any kind of ED.20

Mental health research has revealed that oxytocin has the potential to treat depression, anxiety, and several other mood disorders, regardless of ED status.5 So adding it alongside two PDE5 inhibitors and a dopaminergic agonist could, at least in theory, help tackle ED from more angles for more men than traditional monotherapy or even other combination therapies could.

BlueChew Gold is best suited for a specific set of men who have already:

• Tried monotherapies for ED in the past, like sildenafil or tadalafil, and had less success than they’d like, or
• Tried combination therapies like Rugiet Ready or BlueChew’s Max formula and want to maximize their treatment in both dose and ingredient quantity.

For example, suppose you tried sildenafil on its own and didn’t find doses up to 100mg very useful, then you tried tadalafil on its own and didn’t find doses up to 20mg very useful. You might have then tried to combine them, and maybe it worked better, but not quite consistently enough, even at a high combined dose. You could then look to combine those two PDE5 inhibitors with medications that have different mechanisms of action, like apomorphine and oxytocin.

Of course, some men who’ve never tried an ED medication may still want to take something like BlueChew Gold, perhaps out of desperation or at least out of the desire not to waste time trying medications that only work for close to 90% of men. If you want to throw the kitchen sink at your problem right out of the gate, you could put yourself at unnecessary risk for side effects. But that’s ultimately a conversation to have with the physician BlueChew puts on your case. If they concur that you’re a viable candidate for Gold, you may end up starting there.

Who might want to look elsewhere?

Men new to ED medications are likely the first group that would do well to look elsewhere for treatment, as starting with four medications instead of one is likely ill-advised. That said, it’s important to note that BlueChew also deals in various monotherapies in the same convenient chewable form it uses for its combination treatments. So you’re not really looking elsewhere as much as you are looking at another page on the same site.

It’s also possible that none of the medications in Gold or any other BlueChew product would suffice if the physiological cause of your ED is related to a previous surgical procedure, like a radical prostatectomy or a specific medication with strong ED-influencing side effects. These factors will be taken into account during your intake, so if there’s anything that a clinician believes could make treatment a nonstarter, they’ll go over it with you.

The safest thing about BlueChew Gold or any BlueChew product is that it’s available by prescription only, so you’ll have the benefit of a physician, physician’s assistant, or nurse practitioner reviewing your medical history and communicating with you about whether you’re a good candidate for treatment and what you can expect from the experience.

It also helps that the market for ED medication is so vast that countless millions, if not billions, of dollars have been spent on safety and efficacy trials for the top ED drugs dating back more than 30 years. Those trials have helped establish a set of known risks that you can take into account and symptoms you can watch out for when you begin treatment. And that market force has also spurred the creation of alternatives to some of these medications that act similarly but with lower risk.

So, let’s take a quick look at the potential side effects of each medication in BlueChew Gold to see how the literature characterizes their risk profiles.

Taken together, these drugs appear to be mostly safe for most people, with your doctor’s consultation standing as an effective guard against potential concerns or contraindications with other medications or conditions.

The cost of BlueChew Gold varies based on three factors: dose, quantity, and shipping frequency. You and your doctor will settle on one of three doses, each of which is available in one of four quantities, and each of which can be shipped to you on a monthly or quarterly basis. Lower doses, larger quantities, and quarterly shipping all reduce your final cost.

Here’s a full cost breakdown for each available dose:

Base dose: sildenafil 70mg, tadalafil 18mg, apomorphine 2mg, oxytocin 160IU

High dose: sildenafil 90mg, tadalafil 22mg, apomorphine 3mg, oxytocin 200IU

Extra dose: sildenafil 110mg, tadalafil 22mg, apomorphine 4mg, oxytocin 240IU

As you can see, a quarterly subscription to the base-dose 24-pack gets you the best cost per dose, which is great if the Gold combination at those doses is sufficient for you. Opting for larger quantities, like a quarterly subscription to a 24-pack, is smart, even if you're less sexually active than that, as BlueChew lets you pause and resume your subscription at any time without penalty.

And remember, any of those prices for a first order would be reduced by 10%.

Every order from BlueChew incurs a $5 shipping charge, which is another reason to opt for quarterly billing and shipping. Monthly shipments total up to $60/year, while quarterly shipments cost only $20/year.

Because these are prescription medications, there is no money-back guarantee. That’s typical of this market, but the dose flexibility BlueChew offers means that you can get back in touch with your prescribing physician to determine next steps if you aren’t satisfied with your results.

As we touched on above, BlueChew Gold’s unique combination of prescription medications makes it a potentially very effective choice for men who’ve struggled to find success taking just one medication at a time. But if you’re new to ED treatments, you might not want to start with something this strong. There are also some therapies you can seek alongside BlueChew’s various treatments, including Gold, to help maximize your results.

Let’s take a look at some of those alternative or complementary options: