WOMEN and the G-SPOT?

Has the 'G-Spot' Been Confirmed at Last?

Researcher reports locating elusive source of female pleasure, but others dispute claim.

So, what does the "G" stand for in G-spot? Maybe it's "G" as in Holy Grail, because a Florida gynecologist contends that he has finally found it.

By means of a seven-hour dissection, Dr. Adam Ostrzenski said, he located the elusive source of female sexual satisfaction deep within the vagina. He makes his claim in a paper published online April 25 in The Journal of Sexual Medicine.

But several experts are highly skeptical of Ostrzenski's assertion, saying his paper is long on speculation and headline-grabbing potential and short on proven scientific research.

Ostrzenski, director of the Institute of Gynecology in St. Petersburg, said he performed the layer-by-layer vaginal dissection on the cadaver of an 83-year-old woman who had just died of head trauma.

The existence of the G-spot is a matter of intense debate. It was actually named after scientist Ernest Grafenberg, author of the landmark 1950 article, "The Role of Urethra in Female Orgasm."

Part of the controversy is that -- unlike the clitoris -- the G-spot has never been seen or felt as a distinct structure. Although many women have reported sexual pleasure stemming from the anterior (frontal) part of the vagina, nobody could document a more precise source or describe its size and appearance.

Ostrzenski said the structure uncovered in the study had three distinct sections, sat at a 35-degree angle inside the urethra, and "has a bluish, grape-like appearance."

He said he plans to perform similar forensics on the bodies of women of various ages.

If Ostrzenski and others can consistently reproduce the discovery, he said, "it may absolutely change our view of how the orgasm is created; it will change the understanding of sexual function. It may help in the treatment of the dysfunctional aspect of sex."

Not so fast, cautioned one of three experts who strongly criticized the study.

Barry Komisaruk, a distinguished professor in the department of psychology and associate dean of the graduate school at Rutgers University, submitted the trio's concerns in a journal commentary.

Komisaruk, a behavioral neuroscientist, said the study author made vastly unwarranted conclusions from a single tissue sample without performing appropriate scientific tests. For all anyone knows, he said, rather than locating the G-spot, Ostrzenski may have found a sign of disease, such as a tumor.

The study also lacked "microscopic analysis to determine if it is glandular or erectile tissue, whether the 'vessel' is a blood vessel or a secretory duct, whether the tissue has a nerve supply, and whether it is normal or pathological tissue," Komisaruk said.

"We submit that the author's claim to have discovered 'the' G-spot does not fulfill the most fundamental scientific criteria," wrote Komisaruk and his co-authors.

For claims to be taken seriously, he said, they must be backed by "dissections using microscopic and chemical analysis, in women of all ages. Not only dissections, but observations of this body region in life, using modern imaging and other methodologies, correlating with those who do or do not claim to have a 'G-spot,'" along with other research.

Study author Ostrzenski said he could only speculate as to why nobody had made the discovery before him. "The location of the G-spot is quite deeply situated and maybe that is the reason," he said. "The second aspect is that the vagina exists in separate layers and surgery is usually performed on the upper part."

Besides his own work, Ostrzenski said that genetic findings, studies of vaginal electrical activity and centuries of descriptions from women support the G-spot's existence.

More information

The Kinsey Institute has more about research on sexuality .

(SOURCES: Adam Ostrzenski, M.D., Ph.D., director, Institute of Gynecology, St. Petersburg, Fla.; Barry Komisaruk, Ph.D., Board of Governors Distinguished Service Professor, department of psychology, and associate dean, graduate school, Rutgers University, Newark, N.J.; April 25, 2012, The Journal of Sexual Medicine, online)