Genitourinary Syndrome of Menopause Assessment Tools

Abstract

New therapeutic options are being considered to treat genitourinary syndrome of menopause (GSM), such as vaginal laser, ospemifene, or prasterone, but there is no explicit agreement in the scientific community for its use. Some concerns have arisen on how to evaluate the improvement of GSM symptoms. In 2003, the FDA suggested possible end points for this purpose: change in severity of symptoms, change in vaginal pH, and change in vaginal maturation index (VMI). Contrarily, the most common assessment tools used to quantify severity and improvement of GSM nowadays are the visual analog scale of GSM symptoms, the vaginal health index, and the female sexual function index. In our opinion, subjective and objective variables to evaluate GSM can be differentiated, and not many of the considered objective outcomes are used in the recent literature assessing GSM. There is the possibility that some therapies present only subjective improvement, giving place to a possible placebo effect that is not being evaluated. To conclude, there is a demand to evaluate whether vaginal pH and VMI are enough to assess objectively GSM changes or new objective approaches should be audited.