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Cornell research on reducing clitoral size - v worrying

82 replies

Habbibu · 18/06/2010 15:04

Came across this by accident the other day, via one of DH's fb friends - it's really worrrying and disconcerting. A team from Cornell university have been surgically reducing the size of girls' clitorises - perfectly healthy, but deemed "too large"; they produced a paper apparently showing retained feeling, and intend to follow-up by testing sensation over the years. I think this is quite horrible and disturbing on several levels - anyone else seen this?

OP posts:
QualityTime · 18/06/2010 19:51

Taking them as two separate things, the surgery is bad enough, even if the parents think they are 'fixing' their children, but the post op 'research'
I genuinely feel queasy. And I don't post that often on here.

Seriously, if the IRB has given no approval for this and people/medical professionals at least, KNOW about this, then why tf aren't they putting a stop to it?
That's a serious question btw.

cyteen · 18/06/2010 20:11

I know what you mean Adair - would love to believe it's all bullshit too, but one of the authors of the 'Bad Vibrations' post has at least one well-regarded book on intersex to her name. I don't think she would sully her professional rep by making up a load of vindictive crap. And if it's someone posting in two people's names, I'd be v surprised if they or one of their colleagues hadn't noticed already and taken action.

Habbibu · 18/06/2010 21:41

This is from PubMed, Adair - just the abstract, so no detail, but mention of long-term follow-up.

"J Urol. 2007 Oct;178(4 Pt 2):1598-601. Epub 2007 Aug 16.
Nerve sparing ventral clitoroplasty: analysis of clitoral sensitivity and viability.

Yang J, Felsen D, Poppas DP.

Institute for Pediatric Urology, New York Presbyterian Hospital, Weill Medical College of Cornell University, New York, New York 10021, USA.
Abstract

PURPOSE: Enlargement of the clitoris is often a prominent manifestation of virilizing congenital adrenal hyperplasia and other disorders of sexual development. Controversy persists regarding the viability and sensitivity of the clitoris following clitoroplasty. We present 51 consecutive cases of nerve sparing ventral clitoroplasty performed by a single surgeon. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Nerve sparing ventral clitoroplasty was performed in all patients. Postoperative evaluation for clitoral viability included gross examination and capillary perfusion testing. Patients older than 5 years were evaluated for clitoral sensory testing and vibratory sensory testing. RESULTS: A total of 51 patients 4 months to 24 years old (mean age +/- SD 4.6 +/- 6.8 years) with clitorimegaly underwent nerve sparing ventral clitoroplasty. Of the patients 41 had capillary perfusion testing of the clitoris, of whom all had a viable clitoris. Ten of the 41 patients underwent clitoral sensory testing. Patients reported an average degree of sensation of 3.6 +/- 0.9 at the labia minora and 4.8 +/- 0.4 at the clitoris. Nine of the 10 patients also underwent vibratory sensory testing. Average values for the introitus, clitoris, labia and thigh were 3.56, 1.61, 5.08, and 5.83, respectively. Mean time after surgery for the patients who underwent clitoral sensory testing/vibratory sensory testing was 2.0 +/- 0.8 years. No variations in the sensitivity results were reported at followup in 2 patients. CONCLUSIONS: To our knowledge this is the largest report of followup testing of clitoral viability and sensation after clitoroplasty. Continued long-term followup is ongoing to document long-term sexual function using this nerve sparing ventral approach for clitoroplasty."

I would like this to be a misunderstanding/misreporting - happens often enough, but I still feel queasy about it all. I do get that there are decisions that the parents of intersex children may feel they have to make, and this may not be the purely "aesthetic" procedure I'd initially envisaged, but still... If anyone can access the journal, I guess all the detail would be there, but we still wouldn't know about ethical approval. And even if we did, what would/should/could people do?

OP posts:
bellabelly · 18/06/2010 22:05

Thanks for posting this thread Habbibu - it's important that people get to hear abot it. I am struggling to believe it's true but sadly it looks all too real. Am just astounded that this can have been happening. and

Adair · 19/06/2010 19:03

Makes me feel queasy too.
What can we do? I think the ethics are undoubtedly questionable. I would even wonder whether this is legal. I don't really buy the scientific dress-up tbh. This is an engineered abusive situation. Just horrid.

stripeyknickersspottysocks · 19/06/2010 19:07

So 10 of the females had the follow up to see how sensitive their clitorisis were. The age went up to 24 so I'm hoping its just those 18+ that had the follow up. I'd really think it would be.

Still awful to put a baby/child through the surgery.

Adair · 19/06/2010 19:14

It says "patients older than 5 years were evaluated..." and says the mean age was 4.6 so probably not too many older ones. But I hope you are right.

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