Quitting smoking is a tough business - not made any easier by finding out you have been given a prescription for the anti-impotence drug Viagra instead of tablets to help you kick the habit.

But that is what happened to patients in the Greater Glasgow and Clyde Health Board area.

Health officials there today blamed a computer glitch with the e-Formulary system.

The system automatically selects a list of the most popular drugs when doctors fill out prescriptions. But when GPs chose the anti-smoking pill Zyban their computers printed out a prescription for sildenafil, the generic name for Viagra.

This meant some patients went to the pharmacy with a prescription for the anti-impotence drug.

The health board, which was made aware of the problem yesterday, has alerted all its GPs to the problem.

A spokeswoman for Greater Glasgow and Clyde Health Board, which serves 1.2 million people, told Times Online that she did not believe that anyone actually left a chemist with the wrong medication.

The problem was first identified in mid-November when one GP practice contacted the board to tell them about the error. The board assumed it was an isolated problem until another practice reported a similar glitch last week.

E-mails and memos have been sent to all GPs in the area while computer experts try to correct the problem.

The spokeswoman said: "A computer glitch was discovered by two Glasgow GP practices that use the Glasgow e-Formulary, following a recent update of the online GPass system used throughout Scotland.

"As a precaution an advisory e-mail and memo was issued to all practices which use GPass and have installed the e-Formulary to alert staff.

"At no time was patient care affected by this as all prescriptions are subject to stringent double checking by both prescribing doctors and pharmacy staff."

One Glasgow GP told Scotland's Daily Record newspaper: "In some cases, it's possible GPs will have spotted the problem after printing out a prescription to sign.

"But some will not and unsuspecting patients will have gone to the chemists and unknowingly ordered Viagra. There is a chance the pharmacist would spot this, especially if it was a woman who handed in the prescription.

"But there would be no reason to double check when a man handed it in. One of these drugs helps you give up while the other helps you get it up.

"Thankfully, the side-effects of taking Viagra, even in error, are not too serious. It is unlikely anyone's lives have been put at risk."

Viagra has been found to have uses which could benefit both men and women - in reducing the effects of stress on the heart and in treating the pregnancy disorder pre-eclampsia - but so far it has not been credited with helping people to give up smoking.

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