A study has found there has been a threefold rise in girls asking for genital cosmetic surgery in the last decade
Teenage girls who are increasingly concerned that their genitals don't look "normal" have been inquiring about the possibility of getting a labiaplasty - a surgical procedure that removes tissue from the labia.
Author of the study Dr. Magdalena Simonis from the University of Melbourne, said she felt compelled to conduct the survey after her own patients began asking about the procedure.
She said: "I felt underprepared to respond to those requests. When I spoke to colleagues who were also working in areas of women's health, they also expressed the same sort of experiences with women questioning whether their genitals looked normal.
"Many of them volunteered that that 20 or 25 years ago, this was never an issue."
The study, published in the British Medical Journal, represents the first to explore GPs' experience of female genital cosmetic surgery.
Dr. Simonis said she believes a variety of factors are playing a part in women's anxiety about their genitals, with online porn playing a major role in their dissatisfaction.
More than 1,500 labiaplasties were performed in Australia in 2013 - a threefold increase in the procedure over a decade.
Dr. Simonis asked over 400 GPs a series of questions about the requests they had had for female genital cosmetic surgery.
Of the respondents, 54 per cent had seen female patients who had asked for the surgery, while 97 per cent said they had been asked by women of all ages about the normality of their genitals.
More than half the GPs surveyed said they suspected problems such as depression, anxiety, relationship difficulties and body dysmorphic disorder might often be behind their patients' concerns.
Dr. Simonis pointed out that surgery could lead to complications - something that young women need to be aware of before they decide to have this procedure.
"When we talk about adult women into their 20s of course they are entitled to make their own decisions about their body and surgery, provided they are well informed and have good information and don't have any mental health disorders that might be affecting their decision," she said.
"But the really vulnerable are young women and teens impressed by what they see online and what a lot of the portrayals are like in pornography. I think we need to be carefully looking at those women and ensuring they are supported and better informed."
I'm waiting for Gucci to come out with a purse made out of the left-overs...