Vaginismus is the persistent or recurrent difficulties of the woman to allow vaginal entry of a penis, a finger and/ or any object, despite the womanʼs expressed wish to do so. Many treatment strategies have been proposed for vaginismus, all aiming at achieving successful vaginal penetration. This study was done to evaluate the effect of successful treatment of vaginismus on the sexual function of affected women.

This prospective study included 76 women diagnosed with primary vaginismus. Treatment involved sexual education of the couple, sensate focus exercises and serial vaginal dilatation sessions. Female Sexual Function Index (FSFI) was used to assess the sexual function of the women before, and 3 months after, successful treatment.

The studentʼs t-test was used for statistical analysis with p value < 0.05 considered significant.

Mean age was: 25.2±4.6 years, mean duration of marriage: 4.5±3 years. Main presenting symptom was unconsummated marriage in 30 couple (39.5%), ED in 25 (33%), dyspareunia in 11(14.5%) and infertility in 10 (13%). There were 5 drop-outs, and 2 women failed to achieve intercourse following the dilatation sessions.

FSFI scores were: Desire:2±0.8 before, versus 4.6±1.2 after treatment, Arousal:1.8±0.6 versus 4.5±0.8, Lubrication: 2±0.6 versus 5±0.9,Orgasm:1.8±0.5 versus 4.9±0.7,Satisfaction: 1.7±0.3 versus 5.5±0.5, Pain:1±0.7 versus 5.6±0.5 and Full Score:10.3±2 versus 29.3±2.7. There was a statistically significant improvement in all the scores after treatment.

Vaginismus has a detrimental effect on the rest of the sexual function in affected women, which, however, significantly improve after successful treatment. Therefore, improving the sexual function, not only achieving vaginal penetration,should be the goal when treating women with vaginismus,.