Some interesting new data detailing the process of women getting referred for female genital cosmetic surgery in the UK was described in a recent letter to the editor, published in The Medical Journal of Australia.
A group of three gynecologists and one psychologist, working at both the Royal Hospital for Women in Sydney and University College London Hospitals in the UK describe a review which was conducted of referral letters for women seeking labiaplasty in the UK. It wasn't specified whether the referrals were identified as being for cosmetic reasons, but the details still offer some important information about what might be going into the decision to seek cosmetic genital surgery.
48 letters were reviewed, and here were some of the points noted by the authors of the review:
- the average age of women was 25
- 71% of the women complained about the appearance of their genitals
- 48% complained about physical discomfort
- 44% included mention of sexual problems
The authors note that in two letters the women talked about negative comments about their genitals from previous sexual partners, and seven of the women suggested that the concern about their genitals was raised by their mothers.
The authors were not only interested in what the women themselves had to say about why they wanted the procedure. They also took note of the ways that medical staff write up the letters.
In 23% of the cases where a letter was written recommending surgery, the woman was not ev en examined. 30% of the letters described the women's labia as "normal" and in 25% of the letters the authors not negative and judgmental language (examples they give include "leathery in appearance" and "pendulous and elongated").
Overall the authors document a substantial increase in the number of procedures in the past ten years, more than doubling between 2000 and 2010. However those numbers don't distinguish between cosmetic and medically necessary procedures.
In the end the authors write that cosmetic surgical procedures "may not be the most appropriate way of managing women's body insecurities." I'm inclined to agree with them. But I think we also need to think through the use of concepts of normalcy as a way of arguing against cosmetic surgeries.
It seems to me that medical understandings of what a normal body is represent some of the most harmful frames through which our bodies and our lives are viewed and regulated (see ableism). What is normal has always been specific to a particular place and particular time. Normal is, and has always been, not fixed but relative.
And yet medicine every day delivers judgment about what is normal. In this particular time and place normal looks like a thin (but not too thin) white person who walks around, can drive and talk on their cell phone at the same time, is able to work two jobs, play squash, date and marry in a heterosexual way, etc... This is what medical normal looks like.
As a sex educator I'm reminded every day about the pain that people experience around their own sexuality, pain that is sometimes born out of, and always fueled by, medical messages about what normal sexuality looks like, I know that normal is not to be trusted. Normal acts like it helps, but it doesn't.
Read more - The Medical Journal of Australia: Why are women referred for female genital cosmetic surgery?
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