Vaginal pain during sexual intercourse is an abnormality – Medical Officer
Vaginal Pain during and after sexual intercourse is an abnormality, Dr. Mrs. Anita Owusu-Afriyie a Medical Officer, in the Oncology Unit of the International Maritime Hospital (IMaH) has revealed and called on women experiencing such abnormality to seek for medical attention.
Dr. Mrs. Owusu-Afriyie advised women not to associate pain during and after sexual intercourse with the vigorous nature of the act and ignore the warning signal.
She stressed that such an abnormality is most likely to be a symptom of cervical cancer, and encouraged women who experience irregularity, pain, or any unusual symptoms during and after sex to seek medical attention, particularly for cervical cancer screening to prevent it from advancing.
Dr. Mrs. Owusu-Afriyie made the appeal at a public health advocacy platform “Your Health! Our Concern! a Ghana News Agency Tema Regional Office initiative.
“Your Health! Our Concern! is a public health advocacy platform initiated by the Ghana News Agency Tema Regional Office to explore the parameters of the four approaches to health communication: informative, educating, persuasive, and prompting.
She explained that the symptoms start with the pains during or after sex, which is most often associated with a spot of blood, “if untreated the blood begins to flow staining the lady’s panties”.
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Dr. Mrs. Owusu-Afriyie stressed that the pain was usually felt during intercourse around the womb noting that some people, in addition to these symptoms, had brownish, or reddish abnormal discharge with severe odour.
She noted others also intermittently bled after menstruation and cautioned women to immediately visit the health facility for a checkup.
She disclosed that bleeding and pain after sex were indications that the cervical cancer was at an advancing stage saying other symptoms included pelvic pains and a lot more.
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The IMaH Medical Officer emphasized some people do not experience any of these symptoms but, were leaving with cervical cancer until the cervix was open, it could not be detected.
Dr. Mrs. Owusu-Afriyie said when the cervix is soft with sores and other abnormal features, an examination is conducted under anesthesia to ascertain if the cause was cervical cancer.
She, therefore, called on media practitioners to lead advocacy to create massive cervical cancer awareness across the country to reduce the mortality rate.
She explained that, unlike breast cancer where awareness and screening are observed, cervical cancer awareness is rarely heard, “we need major advocacy to educate the public about the dangers of cervical cancer in the country”.
The IMaH Medical Officer stressed that “most people are more aware of breast cancer than cervical cancer because media platforms have been created and used to spread the news about breast cancer but unfortunately cervical cancer awareness is low”.
She added that even though the month of January has been set aside to publicize cervical cancer, “there was poor publicity and wished the media actively get involved in the propagation of messages about cervical cancer.
“Women in the rural area especially have less knowledge of cervical cancer and it is cancer with the highest mortality rate. I wish most media platforms would get involved in the spread of awareness for people to get screened”.
Dr. Mrs. Owusu-Afriyie called on media houses and other philanthropists to help publicize cervical cancer and educate them on the risk of not being screened or vaccinated.