The vagina: clinical questions and unfulfilled therapeutic needs

Do we really know the anatomical and functional complexity of the vagina, from a clinical point of view? This organ, so trivialized if not neglected, has a peculiar clinical dichotomy. On the one hand it is essential for three main functions of life: the passage of menstrual blood, sexual intercourse, the passage of the baby in childbirth, if carried out, precisely, via the vagina. Its "identity" has been for millennia to be a connecting channel, a passage, between the inside and the outside, and vice versa. A minimalist vision that persists even today, with a disturbing neglect of the many clinical questions that women ask us. On the other hand, the vagina has an extraordinary structural and functional richness, which deserves to be appreciated in the light of the most recent acquisitions, with specific attention to their pragmatic and immediate usefulness in the clinical setting.