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Editorial
1 Consultant Urologist and Assistant Professor, Department of Surgery, SMBT IMSRC, Dhamangaon, Ghoti, Igatpuri, Nashik, Maharashtra, India.
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Sanjay P Dhangar
Urologist and Assistant Professor, Department of General Surgery, SMBT Institute of Medical Sciences & Research Center, Nandi Hills, Dhamangaon, Ghoti, Igatpuri, Nashik, Maharashtra 422403,
India
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Article ID: 100016Z15SD2021
No Abstract
Keywords: Dhat syndrome, India, Kamasutra, Masturbation, Sexuality, Sexual issues in India
Modern India is one of the oldest civilizations in the world. Indus Valley excavation shows traces of civilization at least 5000 years back. Cultural history of India includes prehistoric paintings in mountain caves of Ajanta and Ellora. These show warm emotions of the erotic Hindu temple sculptures of the 9th century. India is endowed with rich ancient literature on sexuality in the form of Vatsyayana’s “Kamasutra” [1]. The concept of sexual function/dysfunction in India is defined differently for person’s social, economic, and demographic backgrounds. It is also differentiated on the basis of rich and poor, men and women, young and old, and able-bodied and disabled persons. India had played a significant role in the history of sex, straight from writing the first literature that treated sexual intercourse as a science, to the modern times being the origin of the philosophical focus of new-age groups’ attitudes on sex. Even sex workers during Mauryan periods were recognized by the government [2].
Though talking sex or about sex is considered paradox in our society, it is still considered as the quintessential form of the life. The anxiety related to the Dhat syndrome is common in India and China [3],[4]. It is a culture bound syndrome. It believes relationship of semen to spiritual and physical health. It is stated that it takes 40 days and 40 drops of blood to form one drop of semen and semen has a capacity of 20 tolas (6.8 ounces). Similar credences are also present in Sri Lanka, Unani (Greek) medicine and Pakistan. That’s why such anxiety.
One more interesting observation evident in the sexuality research was presence of guilt associated with masturbation. Nakra et al. in their study found that around 75% of the patients had practiced masturbation before developing potency disorders and around 43% had guilt associated with masturbation [5].
With such beautiful and hilarious history about sexuality in India, we are far behind in providing basic sex education to adolescents/adults in our country and removing the myths about sexuality among the large population. It would still take many years to stop quack practices related to the sexuality in India. The situation in India is quite grave and challenging as there has been little provision in place for imparting formal training to healthcare providers and faculties dealing with this condition. The time has come to rediscover ourselves in terms of sexuality to attain individual freedom and to reinvest our energy to social issues related to sexuality.
The challenges we are facing today are that the doctors as well as patients fail to talk about sex. The reasons for doctors could be lack of time, lack of training, fear of causing offence, personal discomfort, etc. Patients often hesitate, lack awareness, feel discomfort, and sometimes hide their sexual problems and consider it as a taboo. We also lack funds and good research in the field of sexual medicine. Kerry Dyer et al. in their study concluded that majority of healthcare professionals do not proactively discuss sexuality issues with their patients and this warrants further attention. It looks that we are interested in knowing the sexual life of others but don’t want to discuss the same about own life [6].
We need to know in depth about male and female sexual disorders, advances in the field of erectile dysfunction include new medications, improvements in behavioral techniques, potentially regenerative medicine and stem cell therapy. We should know everything about the sexual responses, which is a multifactorial process that starts from the brain up till the post-intercourse sexual and mental responses. The sexual medicine is just far beyond these limits.
Thus, concept of sexuality is not new. Evidences proved that India was very rich in this concept. Not much open discussions are done as we think in modern India, a country depicting wide social, cultural, and sexual variations. In the present era with rapid globalization our unique Indian sexuality looks diffused up. It’s the time now, to rediscover ourselves in terms of sexuality, to attain sexual freedom and to utilize our energy to sexuality related social issues. Lastly, we should start education on sex. It will further help in maintaining our Indian values; people will become aware of the sexual diseases. In fact, lack of sexual education is one of the reasons of sexual crimes. Doctors and patients should discuss issues related to sexual concerns among them. Like western countries, we should also start undergraduate and post-graduate teaching pertaining the sexual issues. We should also start post-graduate courses in the subject of sexual medicine.
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Dewaraja R, Sasaki Y. Semen-loss syndrome: A comparison between Sri Lanka and Japan. Am J Psychother1991;45(1):14–20. [CrossRef]
[Pubmed]
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Dyer K and das Nair R. Why don’t healthcare professionals talk about sex? A systematic review of recent qualitative studies conducted in the United Kingdom. J Sex Med 2013;10(11):2658–70. [CrossRef]
[Pubmed]
Sanjay P Dhangar - Conception of the work, Design of the work, Acquisition of data, Analysis of data, Drafting the work, Revising the work critically for important intellectual content, Final approval of the version to be published, Agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.
Guaranter of SubmissionThe corresponding author is the guarantor of submission.
Source of SupportNone
Consent StatementWritten informed consent was obtained from the patient for publication of this article.
Data AvailabilityAll relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files.
Conflict of InterestAuthor declares no conflict of interest.
Copyright© 2021 2021 Sanjay P Dhangar. This article is distributed under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium provided the original author(s) and original publisher are properly credited. Please see the copyright policy on the journal website for more information.