Demand for ''Designer vaginas'' on the rise.

The number of female genital cosmetic operations performed on the NHS has risen five-fold in the last decade as women worry they're not 'normal'.

Labial reduction procedures - surgery to reduce the size of the inner ‘lips’ of the vagina - have risen five-fold in the past 10 years, with more than 2,000 operations performed in 2010.

And the trend is reflected in Australia where procedures have more than doubled in the same time period.

The labia are lips which protect the vagina.

There are inner labia – the labia minora - which are thinner, and the outer labia – the labia majora, which have more tissue and fat.

They naturally vary in size and shape, but some women are dissatisfied or distressed about the appearance of their labia, even when they are classified medically as perfectly normal.

The surgery involves reducing the size of a woman's labia minora to make them more symmetrical and smaller than the labia majora.

This is done by cutting away the ‘excess’ skin with a scalpel, or possibly a laser, and stitching up the loose edge with dissolvable stitches, until it heals. 

Experts at the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists at the World Congress in Brisbane, have called for more research to try and better understand women's motivations.

Mr Miles Berry, who works at the Weymouth Street Hospital, London, said he believes the rise in operations is down to an increase in awareness and availability of the procedure.

While many people believe these women are simply seeking a ‘designer vagina’, he said most are having the procedure for functional reasons or because they have been traumatised by having labia that are misshapen or low-hanging.

There are also women who have torn their labia during intercourse, or while horse riding, which as well as being excruciatingly painful, causes bleeding.

‘When women with this condition wear tight clothes, like jeans, they experience chafing,' added Mr Berry.

‘One lady used tampons to keep her labia inside because they were hanging down below her underwear.

‘I saw another lady who was getting recurrent thrush as she had all this extra tissue down there that was moist.’ 

His clinic carried out 49 procedures in 2014 compared to 27 in 2013 – an 80 per cent rise - while NHS figures show there were 2,000 labiaplasties performed in 2010 – a five-fold rise since 2001.

Many women who come for a consultation with Mr Berry are so insecure about the way their labia looks it is impairing their life, he said.

Women can be born with naturally long labia or that are shaped in a way that their owners deem unattractive, he explained.

In some women, they stretch naturally over the course of a lifetime, while others experience stretching or tearing as a result of childbirth, and are embarrassed by the result.

This is usually due to hormones associated with pregnancy, the stretching of the vagina during the birth or due to the loss of the pelvic floor muscles. 

Cathy Cui, one of the researchers in a study led by the University of New South Wales  , said: 'While women request labiaplasty for physical and psychological reasons, the reasons for increasing numbers of surgeries in the last decade are not clear.'

 

 

 

 

 

 

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