Source: kaisernetwork.org/daily_reports/rep_index.cfm?DR_ID=43367

Kaiser network quotes the Washington Post in a report on vaginal rejuvenation. If the Kaiser reflection of the original article is a fair representation of the original, then the usual slant toward the hyperbolic is present:

“procedures that aim to enhance sexual gratification by using a laser to repair vaginal tissue damaged during pregnancy — exemplifies the “last frontier” of plastic surgery, a “realm where medical ethics collide with culture, commerce and technology,” some health experts say.”

Many of us do procedures upon the Labiae without the hype of a laser. Believe it or not there are plenty of reasons not to use a laser “down there.” And I only offer the operation to reduce problem tissues – Reduction labiaplasty. I don’t promise to tighten anything although sometimes that happens. I am a plastic surgeon and stay outside the vagina where the results can be seen. Many of my patients are attractive young ladies with really large Labiae who are too embarrassed to take off their clothes. Their Labiae get caught in clothing and (they feel) appear gender inappropriate in gym wear.

Most of the patients are not damaged by pregnancy or anything else (with the exception of a few who were operated elsewhere.) These ladies were born with these large appendages. And I don’t offer this operation to enhance any one’s sexual gratification. In my hands, it is aesthetic and practical. Then again a woman can’t be gratified sexually if she can’t get her clothes off: can she? Doctors guaranteeing sexual gratification are putting themselves in a precarious position indeed.

It is not an ethical problem to work to get uncomfortably large tissues out of the way of clothing or anything else.

Sorry Washington Post, your article misses the mark if it aims to characterize that which is really occurring in any practice other than the one you visited. Vaginal rejuvenation as you described it is not typical of the medical landscape.

Best Regards,
John Di Saia MD