Sexual Problems in 40% Of U.S. Women

About 40 percent U.S. women report that sex is painful, uninteresting or unsatisfying,but the majority of them aren’t bothered or distressed by it.A new study published Friday in the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology.

The study surveyed 31,581 women aged 18 to 102 from across the U.S. In addition to asking standardized questions about their sexual health, the survey also measured the women’s distress related to their sex lives — including feelings of anger, guilt, frustration, and worry.

Women ages 45 to 64 were most likely to report a distressing sexual problem (14.8%), followed by those ages 18 to 44 (10.8%) and those older than 64 (8.9%).

We thought it would be important to have an accurate statistic for distressing sexual problems,” said Jan Shifren, the lead author and an assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Harvard Medical School in Boston, in an Oct. 30 telephone interview. “If it’s not associated with distress, then it’s probably not affecting a woman’s quality of life.”

“I have long had a problem with the tendency of the healthcare system, aided and abetted by the pharmaceutical industry, to diagnose as a problem a symptom or sign experienced by the majority of people,” she said, citing sexual dysfunction in women as one such example.