Research into a cure for a painful and embarrassing disease will continue thanks to a charitable grant.

Prof Fenella Wojnarowska, based at the Churchill Hospital in Headington, has been awarded £47,000 to help her research increasingly common skin diseases.

WellBeing for Women, a charity which funds research in reproductive health, made the grant so the little-studied illnesses, called lichen planus and lichen sclerosus, can be better understood.

Prof Wojnarowska, of Oxford University, said: "These are quite common diseases that cause untold but completely hidden misery.

"We are just desperate for more information about why they happen so we can treat them."

Because sufferers are often embarrassed about the complaint which occurs around the genital area, it can sometimes be years before they approach a doctor.

Figures show the disease is affecting more and more women, particularly older women, and as many as one in 30 elderly women have the illness. Because it is seen as a 'shameful secret', it is not widely known and research has been difficult to fund.

Prof Wojnarowska said: "It has been extremely difficult to raise money because of the embarrassment factor."

The work by the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust is particularly important because it has been shown that women with these conditions may go on to develop vulval cancer.