Female Sexual Dysfunctions In A More Advanced Classification

On the occasion of the I and II Consensus Development Conference on Female Sexual Dysfunction (2000, 2005), the attempt to solve this problem was born, through the proposal of a new classification of female sexual dysfunctions. Clinical experience shows that, for women involved in stable relationships, other factors, especially non-sexual ones, can become predominant components in igniting and satisfactorily carrying out sexual exchange. In addition, the sexual response of women does not seem at all stable and constant over time: for example, it can be closely interconnected with the variability induced by alterations of the menstrual cycle, pregnancy, puerperium, menopause and, in each of these cases, for both biological, psychic and relational reasons.

Based on these recent theoretical formulations, female sexual dysfunctions are divided into: desire disorders, arousal disorders, orgasmic disorders, pain disorders.

Desire disorders

The desire, subjectively experienced, arises from a set of factors which are at the same time biological, psychic and relational and which, influencing each other, contribute to nourish and modulate desire itself.

Arousal disorders

Sexual excitement in women is a predominantly mental and subjective phenomenon that is not always accompanied by an awareness of vasocongestive genital and extragenital changes. In these Female Sexual Dysfunctionsdisorders, the use of oral pharmaceutical therapy agents is especially beneficial: sildenafil (Female Viagra, Lovegra, Womenra) restores the vascular flow and stimulates the work of Bartholin glands responsible for vaginal lubrication.

Orgasm disorders

According to the latest nosographic indications, the orgasm disorder is defined as a marked reduction in the intensity of orgasmic sensations or marked delay in orgasm in response to any type of sexual stimulation and despite the presence of a high level of subjective sexual excitement.

Disorders characterized by pain

Pain is much more than a simple symptom that leaves its traces only on a physical level; it is influenced by emotions and by social and environmental conditions, and being therefore different for each individual, an experience of not easy classification results.

In conclusion, the multidimensional nature of female sexuality, linked to aspects such as the ideal of femininity, lifestyle, relationships, biological factors and affective life, imposes a multifactorial framework of sexual disorder.

For these reasons an integrated approach to the sexological patient seems to be, as supported by international literature, an elite intervention, synthesizing the medical-psychological needs that are at the basis of the treatment of sexual dysfunctions offered by modern medicine and pharmacology.

Published by Evelyn Green