43 percent of women suffer from sexual dysfunction
These days, you can hardly walk by a television without seeing an ad for Viagra, Cialis, or any of the other “ED” drugs. (“ED” is the politically correct way of saying “erectile dysfunction.) And because there is a long and now widely known laundry list of sexual woes for men, many assume that only men suffer from sexual dysfunction (SD).
However, nothing could be further from the truth.
According to a new study conducted by Massachusetts General Hospital, women not only suffer from SD, but there is a far higher percentage of women SD sufferers. Shocked? Well, don’t be.
While 31 percent of the men in this survey admitted to dealing with at least one kind of SD, a staggering 43 percent of the women surveyed reported that they also wrestled with their own sexual issues. These problems included painful intercourse, a decline of sexual desire, and an inability to achieve orgasms.
Ready for a bigger shock: just 12 percent of the women who admitted that they suffered from these problems said that the issues caused them any distress.
According to the leader of the study, Dr. Jan Shifren, an associate professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Massachusetts General, “Sexual problems are common in women, but problems associated with personal distress, those which are truly bothersome and affect a woman’s quality of life, are much less frequent.”
The survey polled 32,000 women from across America, aged between 18 to over 100. And, if you ask me, the massive age difference in the sample group takes a bit of the shock out of the idea that 43 percent of women are suffering from sexual dysfunction.
Indeed, the breakdown of the statistics bear my theory out: of those surveyed, it was women over the age of 65 who had the highest incidence of SD, but this same group also reported having the lowest level of distress as a result of their SD. Should we be shocked that women between the age of 65 and 100 – who, let’s face it, probably aren’t having too much sex to begin with – aren’t too worried that they’ve got some degree of sexual dysfunction?
And, as if to underscore what I’m sure would be another widely held assumption, it was the women in the youngest age group (from 18 to 44) who reported the lowest levels of both SD and distress from SD. Again I’m just not shocked by this.
If the goal of the research was to reinforce many of the preconceptions about women’s sexuality, then I believe the study succeeded. They determined 1) younger women are less likely to have SD. 2) Women in middle age (from 45 to 64), the time when the body begins to change, had the highest degree of stress resulting from SD. 3) Older women have more SD, but it doesn’t really bother them.
I think I could’ve told you that without compiling a survey from 32,000 women.
Big Pharma companies seek Viagra for women
Big Pharma companies are working hard to find a female equivalent of Viagra. Not only to solve women’s sexual issues, but for the absurd amount of profits such a drug is sure to bring. Recently, researchers have been encouraged by a testosterone patch which they claim significantly boosts the number of satisfying sexual experiences among the women who’ve tested it.
Apparently, users of the 300-microgram “Intrinsa” patch, as it’s called, had sex that they deemed “gratifying” an average of 2.1 times per month compared to 1.2 times per month for a lower dose of the patch, and .7 times per month on a placebo treatment.
But you know how I feel about jacking artificial hormones into your body. The “gratifying” sex these women have could eventually be seriously off set by potential side effects like sprouting hair on the face and chest, not to mention an increased risk of breast cancer. Maybe it’s just me, but I’m guessing that those pleasing sexual experiences are likely to drop off to an average of 0.0 times a month when you’re a woman with a moustache and a hairy chest.
