The postnatal examination is in the first instance an examination of the woman’s physical health. Routine questions about her general wellbeing, lactation, duration of lochia and healing of the perineum will be asked as a matter of course. Details of the delivery may need to be discussed. Blood pressure and weight are checked and pelvic [...]
Mr. C. has severe premature ejaculation and he put it this way. ‘Imagine what it is like. You put on a condom to stop coming. Sometimes I come when she is watching me put it on, and if I get inside I am likely to go soft and it will come off before I ejaculate.’
He [...]
Miss J., aged 19, was 17 weeks pregnant. This would be her second abortion. She was very ambivalent about whether she wanted to have a baby or continue with her free, youthful life of going out whenever she felt like it and spending her wages on clothes. She revealed that she had had a lot [...]
History-taking will not be regarded as an interrogation or intrusion if its relevance is explained. To facilitate rapport during history-taking and to avoid misunderstandings, the doctor needs to be specific and wherever possible avoid medical terminology. Thus the words ‘clotted or inflamed blood vessels’ may replace ‘thrombophlebitis’. It is important that words such as ‘migraine’ [...]
Men who feel inadequate, and who are unable to compete with their peers because of lack of skills and training, may put great emphasis on their ability to get their partners pregnant, some talking of their plans to have a football team. Condoms are mocked; they split and tear and cannot hold back their powerful [...]
As menstruation stops the vagina is usually ‘dry’ for some days. This is followed by a phase in which vaginal mucus is found to be thick, whitish or yellowish, opaque and sticky. Before ovulation the mucus becomes clear, slippery and watery, like the white of a raw egg and you have to stop having intercourse [...]
This is all about searching for the contributory causes of the problem and then treating it in as precise a way as possible. Such therapy is, of course, highly personal and unique to the individual or couple being treated. Nearly always the unravelling of the problem involves uncovering layer after layer of complexity and is [...]
This then describes the basic mechanics and we shall see later what can go wrong. Overall, it is probably fair to say that in our teens we experience intense, quick onset orgasms and that as we mature arousal takes longer, lasts longer and produces better quality orgasms. This is certainly true up to old age [...]
The penis is a man’s most obvious and talked about sex organ. Most men at some time or another have worried about the size of their penis, just as women concern themselves with their breast size. Surveys of women who have had many sex partners show that a man’s penis size really does not matter [...]
Marriage, or the close man-woman relationship that exists whether or not it has been dignified by the marriage ceremony, can be an enormously strong bond. It can withstand long-term illness, mental and physical disabilities, sexual deprivation, addiction to alcohol in one partner, unemployment in the breadwinner and so on. All of this suggests that a [...]