Diabetes and Sexual Health in Women

Abstract

Women’s sexual dysfunction (SD) is defined as a disorder of sexual desire, arousal, orgasm, and/or sexual pain, which results in significant personal distress and may have a negative effect on a woman’s health and quality of life. Although previously published data suggest that sexual complaints are highly prevalent among women with diabetes mellitus (DM), the scientific community has scarcely investigated the potential correlation between diabetes mellitus and women’s SD. In case-control studies, SD was reported at a significantly greater rate in women with DM type 1 (DM1) than among controls – arousal difficulties being most common. Interestingly, sexual complaints were not isolated in occurrence, because women with DM often reported at least two sexual problems. Sexual disorders are also highly prevalent in women with DM type 2 (DM2), with low sexual desire being most commonly reported. Few treatment options and no specific compounds have been investigated to address the various types of SD in women with diabetes. Therefore, additional medical research, education and training are needed to improve the identifi- cation and management of SD in diabetic women. In this context, it is of paramount importance that both researchers and clinicians address the issue of sexuality and sexual health among diabetic women in well-designed longitudinal studies that have sufficient statistical power and are free of bias.