Lubricant Use, Can This Negatively Affect Sexual Health?

Dr. Goldstein describes why lubricant use does not negatively affect a woman's sexual health, but it is still important for her to discover the cause of vaginal dryness during sexual intercourse.

Dr. Goldstein:
Lubricants are important in women who have dryness and some sexual pain during penetration. I am not sure long-term use would be a problem but I think more physiologic treatment would make a lot more sense.

So let’s say a woman is on birth control pills and is dry and she is 25 and she is using lubricants, maybe a logical and rational thing would be to stop using birth control pills because birth control pills stop the ovaries from working. That’s how you get your contraception; you prevent ovulation.

If they are not, some of these new birth control pills have really low estrogen dosages and we are now seeing labias start to resorb and start to look menopausal, which is really sad but dryness could happen in low estrogen states. So maybe lubricants are helpful, but perhaps getting to the underlying reason would be even more helpful and I would encourage the combination, at least lubricants and finding out what’s wrong.

About Dr. Irwin Goldstein, M.D.:
Dr. Irwin Goldstein is Director of San Diego Sexual Medicine at Alvarado Hospital, the Secretary of the International Society for the Study of Women’s Sexual Health, a former President of the Sexual Medicine Society of North America and a Clinical Professor of Surgery at University of California at San Diego.

Dr. Goldstein has been involved with sexual dysfunction research since the late 1970s. His specialties include penile microvascular bypass surgery, surgery for dyspareunia, physiologic investigation of sexual function in men and women, and diagnosis and treatment of sexual dysfunction in men and women.

Visit Dr. Goldstein at San Diego Sexual Medicine at Alvarado Hospital