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Shame 'drives genitalia surgery'

11/12/2007

Women seeking surgery to reduce the size of their labia are driven by shame that the body part does not look 'normal', a new study has found.

Their view of what is normal was based on social norms in the media that female genitalia should be 'invisible' with no protruding labia.

Researchers at the University of Liverpool gathered views from women who had undergone labial reduction in an NHS hospital setting.

Seventeen women were asked to take part and six accepted.

The incidence of labial reduction in the NHS has doubled in recent years, and today's study suggests the increase is due to women increasingly feeling stigmatised by social norms about how they should look.

Published in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, the study says health professionals are delivering mixed messages about what is normal.

It claims that the women's perception of being 'abnormal' was inadvertently reinforced by being given reassurance of normality, alongside referral to a specialist for further investigation or surgical intervention.

Another key reason identified for labial reduction was the worry that their appearance was having a negative impact on their sex lives.

But the study found that although the operation did have the effect of making the women less self-conscious, expectations of improved sex life and relationships were not met for all women.

"The problem is that clinical time is usually limited and we are dealing here with what are probably long-held attitudes and issues of self-esteem which are quite difficult to change," commented Dr Ros Bramwell of the Liverpool University research team.

"Further research is needed into potential psycho-educational interventions to help change women's perception of their need for surgery."