Time for a grown-up lecture

Alright ladies, I know how many of your have cutesy names for your anatomy. I don’t know if it’s modest or shy or even juvenile, but our society has non-technical terms for the female anatomy. The cutesy names may serve a purpose when toilet training children, but they can let women down in adulthood. Understanding the female anatomy increases in importance when health conditions such as pelvic organ prolapse, incontinence and vaginal relaxation occur.

Our ABAGyn member gynecologists, urologists and urogynecologists report that the majority of women have an incomplete understanding of their anatomy.

Aba doesn’t want to over lecture, even Oprah is guilty of saying “vajay-jay” on air. Here at ABAGyn our goal is to help educate women and their surgeons about aesthetic gynecology. Over the next few posts, Aba will give a solid overview of the female anatomy and proper terminology.

“What about my labia?”

Our last post prompted a fair number of you to ask why Aba left out labia (lips at the opening of your vagina) in the discussion of medical conditions treated by vaginal rejuvenation. First, it’s important to know that many physicians incorrectly refer to labial procedures as vaginal rejuvenation. This can be very confusing. The labia are part of the external genital properly called the vulva.

Women experience enlargement, irregular shape, and/or discoloration of the labia following vaginal childbirth. However, aging and loss of youthful hormone levels may also contribute to these conditions. Some women will not have these risk factors but rather have a genetic tendency toward enlarged, malshaped, or discolored labia.

Aba is not in the habit of referring readers to other web sites, but we found an ABAGyn member surgeon with outstanding labia deformity diagrams. If you are interested in seeing some abnormalities in greater detail, click this link.

Is there an actually medical condition that VR treats?

This is a question Aba is hearing a great deal in your emails. Many women are wondering if the medical community associates vaginal rejuvenation with a medical condition.

Many women with a condition called pelvic organ prolapse also have another medical condition known as vaginal relaxation. After childbirth the vagina is stretched and does not return to its original size and shape. This condition frequently leads to decreased feelings of friction and loss of sexual satisfaction by the patient. Generally, the more vaginal deliveries, the worse the condition gets. Many women experience decreased sensation and sexual satisfaction during intercourse.

Vaginal relaxation may be treated with vaginal rejuvenation at the same time as an insurance-based prolapse surgery. New incisionless laser techniques remove adipose (fat) tissue from around the vagina, shrink the stretched out supporting structures of the vagina that have been damaged from childbirth or aging and stimulate the growth of new supporting tissues. The goal of any good vaginal rejuvenation procedure should be to restore or create a normal vaginal anatomy.

What does Aesthetic Gynecology mean?

Let’s get this blog off to an informative start. You may have arrived here in search of some basic information like what exactly is aesthetic gynecology. Aesthetic gynecology is a sub-specialty of gynecology focusing on aesthetic surgical procedures for the labia and vagina.

This term is becoming more common. It’s used in the name of our board. It combines aesthetic or visual concerns with the medical side of gynecology. The short answer is that most of the time aesthetic gynecology is used when talking about the vaginal and labial rejuvenation.

Many times women start out asking their surgeon about vaginal rejuvenation. But when they describe what they want, they are actually referring to labial rejuvenation. Women notice changes in the appearance of their labia following childbirth or as a result of aging. These changes are something we don’t have to accept as part of aging any more. As women, we’re always striving to look and feel our best. Women who’ve had labial rejuvenation talk about feeling more confident during intimacy.

When it comes to vaginal rejuvenation, a procedure often associated with aesthetic gynecology, the medical side plays a larger role. This is a procedure designed to treat vaginal relaxation, a condition our board defines the loss of tone in the supporting structures of vagina. Women nearing menopause tend to find the symptoms of vaginal relaxation more noticeable.

Introducing Ask Aba

At ABAGyn, our mission is to promote the highest quality aesthetic gynecology through education, dissemination of professional information, and the establishment of professional standards. Along with encouraging education, we also want serve as a resource to the public about the field of aesthetic gynecology.

Creating this blog is one of the many ways, we hope to inform women interested in the latest advances in our field. “Ask Aba” will allow anyone, not just women, to post or email questions to us. We’ll also be giving out new information on procedures and resources through our blog too.

We can’t wait to hear from you.

If you don’t want to post directly to the blog, feel free to email Aba@abagyn.com with your private questions. We will answer the questions here on the blog, but keep your questions anonymous.