Clinical Connections: The Pelvic Health Edition, Part 2
Orgasm and vibrator research hits the medical journals on how to make every day a holiday. The staid medical world is under assault by female researchers! Be still, my heart! (but not too still...)
(For those new to Women Unbroken, a heads up that among other professional lives I was once a women’s health nurse practitioner and a certified nurse-midwife. To the ongoing horror of my sons, my perspective has always been that sex is healthy, normal, and—like nutrition— should be talked about that way. Having come of professional age in hospital labor & delivery units,1 I’m still somewhat surprised when I startle people by talking about sex openly, but it does perk cocktail parties right up. If you’re not there yet, you may want to skip this and look for something boring.)
If you missed our all-time most-read Clinical Connections post, A celebration of liberating women’s mysterious “down there” to everyday science and healthcare, it’s a good introduction to today’s post. As we noted then, “If you're in women's health, strange things make your year. One was when women's pelvic medicine finally emerged from thousands of years of medical darkness into just another solvable set of issues.”
My year is being made again. Two recent medical research studies on women’s orgasms and sex toys that were reported in otherwise starched-shirt medical journals show what can happen in medical research when it’s not dominated by somber research by and about men.2 I just wish I’d been around when the usual journal readers opened them up and found these little gems.
Talk about out of the box thinking.
Both research reports in respected medical journals were authored, of course, by recognized female researchers at several renowned universities and medical centers in the US and Europe. So, that’s official medical approval for you to peek into the articles as well! Here’s to happier holidays for women!
The last link here is related; it’s by another female physician who writes on Substack. and has an eight (8!) part series (just in Part 1!) entitled Come Again.3
Vibrator play means healthier ‘down theres’
The first research report that the guys are probably hiding in smoking desk drawers is “The Role of Vibrators in Women's Pelvic Health: An Alluring Tool to Improve Physical, Sexual, and Mental Health” in the International Urogynecology Journal. Gotta love “alluring” in the article title—here’s to female researchers! It’s just not a word you’d usually see in stuffy medical journals.
Feeling vapors coming on already? Now sure you’re ready for the raw journal details? You know what they say about unusual exercise: start slowly. Here are five takeaways on this research from always-irreverent Dr. Kelly Casperson, who helpfully provides a discount code and link for vibrators.
Regular vibrator use leads to substantial improvements in multiple aspects of sexual function.
Women in the study had fewer bothersome pelvic organ prolapse symptoms and less genitourinary discomfort.
Vibrator use enhances vaginal tissue health and reduces atrophy, likely through increased pelvic blood flow.
Vibrator use was linked to a significant decrease in depression scores.4
Vibrators could be recommended by healthcare providers as part of a holistic approach to women’s pelvic health, much like how penile rehabilitation5 is used post-prostatectomy in men.
Toys in the bedroom means more fun for everyone
The most recent publication is in the February Journal of Sexual Medicine, admittedly usually a little more lively: “Toys in the bedroom: use of sexual devices in partnered sexual activity is associated with higher female orgasmic intensity, arousal, and sexual satisfaction and is not related to psychopathologies.”6 Key points from the Journal summary:
Sex devices are tools that can improve the sexual health of users, but their effects on sexual outcomes in partnered intercourse have rarely been evaluated.
The use of sex devices in the context of partnered intercourse is associated with increased sexual function and more intense orgasmic experience.
That’s all medical research speak, of course. Basically, as Dr. Casperson, says, the research demonstrates that vibrators used with a partner means stronger orgasms, higher arousal, and more sexual satisfaction. Here’s her read on this newest research piece; it’s for paid subscribers, but there’s a link for a seven day free trial on the page. Be ready: she’s reliably cheeky, as the Brits would say.
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Finally, a detailed instruction manual! An eight (8!) part series, Come Again
So, now back to Dr. Lauren Streicher, an OB-Gyn professor at Northwestern University who specializes in menopause and sexual medicine, and her beguilingly-titled Come Again series. Here’s Episode 8, Requirements to Get the Job Done. The Come Again podcast episodes are for paid subscribers, but the first one is free, and you could get lucky with a Substack offer to read one or more other episodes for free. You may also agree with her 24,000 followers that her Substack is well worth $7.50/month. Here are the titles of the episodes in Part 1:
FREE intro: Sexuality and orgasm—the what, why and who of Come Again
Are you having good sex? A visit with Dr. Ruth
SEX has many meanings: The definition of sex is not straightforward, with Dr. Rachel Zar
What could go wrong? Unfortunately, a lot
Is it menopause or mid-life? It’s not just your hormones that are sabotaging your sex life
“I’d like to Buy an O please” An overview and historical look at orgasm
A view from my side of the stirrups: Making your privates less private
Requirements to get the job done: Estrogen is not on the list.
That’s enough for one make-every-day-a-holiday-for-women post! We’ll undoubtedly be back with more. Happy spring—enjoy your weekend!
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Trust me, unless you’ve worked there, you have no idea what backroom conversations are like in a OB service that deals 24/7 with the results of human sexual activity.
The average age of physicians in the US is 55, and they’re still 62% male, down from 74% male just twenty years ago as Boomers retire. Boomer physicians, by far predominantly male, were one out of three researchers when most “modern” medical research that’s we’re still using today was in process.
If you aren’t laughing yet, you need to close this post, meditate or have a libation or whatever, and return at a better time. In the meantime, in keeping with the spring equinox, I’m thanking Goddess once again for female docs!
As a survivor of 16 years of (excellent) Catholic education, I’m waiting for some researcher to link this research to the most common Boomer Catholic high school reunion conversation: the moods of the sisters/nuns teachers. Everyone has a ruler or similar story.
Ha! See? That article was written by nine guys in *2015.* No research then on the female equivalent, of course.
You have to love the gratuitous “not related to psychopathologies” part of the title. That’s a dig at the 18th century thinking hold-outs who still think masturbation is somehow linked with insanity (and the probability of going to hell). “Masturbation insanity” —a real diagnostic term—has been around since the 1700s, and by the early 1800s, European and American physicians concurred that masturbation led to insanity.” No relationship to our shared prim European religious roots, of course.