Tag: Pap smears
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The Problem of Puberty
Puberty is alchemy, don’t you think? Like the chrysalis of a butterfly, the girl emerges from the pupal case of her childhood into an adolescent -an almost-woman- with hormones ablaze. It is a magic time of change, both in growth and physiology, but also in cognitive development. It is a time of evolving expectations, but…
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The Gyne Weed
I think most of us have a rather Schadenfreude relationship with weeds: on the one hand, they are undesirables, illegal aliens usurping land otherwise dedicated to something useful; but on the other, some of them are quite pretty -even beautiful. Especially in someone else’s garden. Of course it’s all a matter of context, isn’t it? It’s a…
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What’s in a Word?
Alexithymia. Ever heard of it? Me neither. It sounds like one of those words you’d get in a national spelling bee when they’re trying to off you. Fortunately it has a rather pedestrian etymology: ‘a’ meaning ‘without’; ‘lexis’ –speech, or words; and ‘thymos’ – soul, or emotions. In other words: no words for feelings. Hmm……
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Pelvic Exams
Medicine has been my life, and over the years I have seen my specialty of obstetrics and gynaecology break free of many of the traditions that shackled it to the past. Obstetrics was once a superstition-clad field -a world unto itself; gynaecology was mired in taboo and cultural sensitivities that often precluded open-minded and unbiased research and therapy. To a…
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HPV
Cancer of the uterine cervix is a sexually transmitted disease; it is the second most common cancer of women in the world and it is spread sexually. Who would have guessed? The clues were there all along, of course: it was more common in sex workers, and women who had become sexually active at an…
musingsonwomenshealth.com 