Words about women’s health and gynecological care

All the ovarian massage and private parts care packages that cost you thousands are IQ taxes. For truly effective maintenance, you only need to do three things: "daily basic care + avoiding pitfalls + regular physical examinations". There are not so many bells and whistles at all.

I just treated a 22-year-old girl last week. She just graduated and started working. She saved two months’ salary to get a private care card for a beauty salon. She goes to have private parts fumigated and ovarian massage every week. She also takes the private part lotion from the beauty salon to wash her lower body every day. As a result, she is itchy when she comes. I couldn't sit still, and the leucorrhea was found to be vulvovaginal candidiasis, which is commonly known as fungal vaginitis. The bacterial flora was completely imbalanced. She also asked me if it was because I was too "dirty". I told her that you were washing too frequently and doing it, but she still couldn't believe it.

This is the misunderstanding that many people have about gynecological care. They always think that the private parts should be "cleaner, the better" and that the ovaries should be "pressed more to make them younger". In fact, this is not the case at all. Let’s talk about the most controversial topic of private parts washing and care first. Western medicine guidelines clearly state that in a healthy state, the vagina has its own microecological balance. Lactobacilli are dominant and can inhibit the growth of harmful bacteria. If you wash or even irrigate the vagina with lotion every day, the beneficial bacteria will be directly washed away, and harmful bacteria will of course take advantage of it. However, some Chinese medicine practitioners believe that if you usually eat a lot of spicy food, sit for a long time and feel bored, and occasionally experience mild itching of the vulva or yellowish leucorrhea, and if there is no other discomfort, you can occasionally use a mild herbal lotion to wash the vulva externally to relieve the symptoms of dampness and heat, as long as it does not wash into the inside. Both views are actually reasonable. The key is not to destroy the balance of the vagina itself.

Don’t think that it’s just little girls who have trouble. I had a 34-year-old patient in the past two months. I pay special attention to maintenance. I heard that ovarian massage can delay aging and cure dysmenorrhea. I have to go to the beauty salon once a week. But after the massage that day, I suddenly had a stomachache when I went home and broke out in a cold sweat. I went to the emergency department to find out that it was an ovarian cyst with torsion. In the end, I couldn’t cut off one side of the appendage. I couldn’t cry. Think about it, the ovaries are deep in the pelvic cavity, with the bladder in front and the rectum behind them. Normally you can't touch them when you press your belly. If you feel soreness in the ovaries when you press them, it means you either have pelvic inflammatory disease or ovarian cysts, or the soreness in your stomach has nothing to do with the ovaries. If you press them hard enough to have an effect, you will jump in pain.

Some people also ask me if I want to take those ovary maintenance capsules and soy isoflavones that cost hundreds of dollars a bottle? This actually depends on the situation. The view of Western medicine is that if you do not have estrogen-dependent diseases such as breast nodules, uterine fibroids, and endometrial polyps, and you have symptoms such as hot flashes and insomnia when you are approaching menopause, you can take appropriate supplements after a doctor’s evaluation to relieve discomfort. However, if you have these problems, blind supplementation of estrogen will stimulate the growth of nodular fibroids, which is not worth the loss. Traditional Chinese medicine generally recommends daily dietary supplements. Drinking a cup of soy milk and eating some soy products every day is enough to absorb natural phytoestrogens. There is no need to spend extra money on health products. After all, very little of what we eat can ultimately affect the ovaries. You will stay up two nights less and get angry twice less, which is more effective than any supplement.

My daily care habits are actually very simple. I rinse my vulva with warm water when I take a shower. I never rub it with shower gel or lotion. I buy pure cotton underwear that costs more than ten yuan a pair. I change it every day. After washing, I hang it on the balcony to bask in the sun. Oh, by the way, there is another point that many people overlook. Both people must wash themselves before and after sex, especially the man’s smegma, which is really the cause of cervicitis and vaginitis in many women. Don’t be embarrassed to mention it. You have to take care of your own body.

Don’t think you don’t need to check if you don’t feel uncomfortable. Women who are sexually active should do TCT+HPV screening once a year, which is cervical cancer screening. Girls who are not sexually active can also have an abdominal B-ultrasound every year to check the condition of the uterus and ovaries. Many problems really have no symptoms in the early stage. Wait until you have pain or bleeding before going for the test, which may be delayed. I met a 28-year-old girl before. The physical examination at work showed positive for high-risk HPV, and there was also a problem with TCT. Further biopsy showed that it was a precancerous lesion. Because it was discovered early, a minor operation would be fine. If she had not gone for a physical examination, she might have developed cervical cancer after another three to five years, which would have been troublesome.

In fact, after all, gynecological care is really not that mysterious. The more you mess with it, the more fragile it becomes. On the contrary, girls who are careless, do basic things well, and don’t buy IQ tax products blindly have fewer gynecological problems. After all, our body itself has a strong ability to regulate itself. It is the best way to take care of yourself if you don’t do it any harm.