Culdoscopy: A foundation for natural orifice surgery - Past, present, and future

For more than 100 years, transvaginal endoscopy, later known as culdoscopy, has been performed to visualize the abdominal and pelvic cavity. At one time, culdoscopy flourished as both a diagnostic and therapeutic procedure. The technique came under criticism for its restricted visualization and limited operative capabilities balanced against rare but concerning complications. With rising advances in rigid endoscopic technology, laparoscopy rapidly replaced culdoscopy, pushing it to the edge of obscurity for decades. Now recent interest in natural orifice transluminal endoscopic surgery has resulted in a reconsideration of culdoscopy as a means of facilitating this promising surgical approach.