Lagos,Nigeria
Tuesday, March 19th, 2024

Search
Search
Close this search box.

How To Effectively Treat Uterine Fibriods

By Grace Shaibu
Wednesday, December 13th, 2017
No comment

Fibroid treatment, explained

Years ago, removing your entire uterus was the only way to take care of uterine fibroids. Nowadays, there are many options for uterine fibroid treatment. If you have fibroids, take some time to decide on the best uterine fibroid treatment for you.

The benign, non-cancerous overgrowths of the muscle cells in the uterus aren’t malignant, so there’s no need to panic, says Janice Newsome, MD, associate division director of interventional radiology and image-guided medicine at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta.

Your options are based on your uterine fibroid symptoms. Not everyone with fibroids has symptoms, and whether or not you do usually depends on how big the fibroids are, how many there are, and where they’re located. Signs of uterine fibroids include heavy bleeding, pelvic pressure, having to urinate a lot, back pain, and constipation or diarrhea.

fibriods

When deciding on a fibroid treatment option, you and your doctor will also take into consideration “the desire for future fertility,” says Jenny M. Jaque, MD, chief of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Southern California’s Keck School of Medicine. Unlike hysterectomies, many other uterine fibroid treatments allow you to still get pregnant later on.

Watchful waiting

If you have uterine fibroids but don’t have any symptoms or only minor symptoms, doing nothing–while staying alert for any changes–is an option.

“If the fibroids are not causing any problems, and they’re not dramatically enlarged, they can be watched,” says Mitchell S. Kramer, MD, chairman of obstetrics and gynecology at Northwell Health’s Huntington Hospital in Huntington, New York. “You do not necessarily need to intervene.”

This is often the strategy when a woman is nearing menopause or post-menopause. Estrogen causes fibroids to grow; often, as estrogen naturally diminishes, so do fibroids.

Watchful waiting is also an option if you want to get pregnant and the fibroid doesn’t look like it’s going to interfere with pregnancy. “From a pregnancy point of view, some fibroids are very problematic, some aren’t,” says Dr. Kramer.

Specialists can help you decide if this option is a safe and effective one for you.

Diet and lifestyle changes

“Because we actually don’t understand what causes fibroids to form, it’s difficult to say what you should do to prevent them,” says Dr. Newsome. We do know that fibroids are sensitive to hormones, especially estrogen, and that lifestyle modifications that affect hormone production may alleviate some symptoms.

In fact, diet and exercise may be the two main things you can do at home to treat uterine fibroids.

Estrogen affects fibroids, and fat cells produce estrogen, says Dr. Newsome. Shedding some excess body fat could therefore improve fibroid symptoms, she says. While there are no large studies on diet or foods that can shrink fibroids, there is some anecdotal evidence, she adds, that women who follow a plant-based diet have improved fibroid symptoms.

Exercise may also help ease some uterine fibroid symptoms, but there are no known ways to get rid of fibroids naturally, says Dr. Newsome.

GnRH agonists

If watchful waiting and lifestyle changes aren’t options for you, doctors may move on to hormonal medications to control symptoms and even shrink the fibroids.

Several of these medications, like leuprolide (Lupron), are gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) agonists. They work by blocking hormone production. This causes the fibroids to shrink, which relieves uterine fibroid symptoms like heavy bleeding, pelvic pain, or needing to urinate all the time. Reducing bleeding is especially important to lower a woman’s risk of anemia.

But halting hormone production means you may also end up with menopausal symptoms like hot flashes. Some doctors prescribe “add back” medications–low doses of hormones–to counter that effect without decreasing how well the GnRH agonist works.

GnRH agonists, available in pill, nasal spray, and injection forms, are typically used for a short period of time. They can be helpful in reducing the size of a fibroid before surgery, for example. Fibroids will grow back after these medications are stopped.

Hormonal meds

Hormonal contraceptives are another option to treat uterine fibroid symptoms. They won’t necessarily reduce the size of uterine fibroids, but they may regulate periods or reduce heavy bleeding. This could be the pill or a progestin-releasing IUD, as long as the location of the fibroids doesn’t interfere with inserting one safely, says Dr. Jaque.

uterine-fibroid-in-women

Androgens, so-called male hormones, like danazol (a synthetic drug that mimics testosterone), can stop periods and shrink fibroids. However, this treatment might also result in weight gain, a lower voice, and unwanted hair.

MRI-guided focused ultrasound

In this non-surgical procedure, doctors use a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) system to locate your uterine fibroids then zap them with high-frequency ultrasound. “It’s considered to be a permanent procedure to eliminate or decrease the size of the fibroids,” Dr. Kramer says.

The actual procedure is painless and noninvasive. It’s performed inside an MRI machine, and you can usually go home the same day.

So far, MRI-guided focused ultrasound to treat uterine fibroids looks safe but is still relatively new. Researchers are still collecting long-term data, but it seems safe to use if you still want to get pregnant.

Uterine artery embolization

Also called uterine fibroid embolization, this procedure deprives fibroids of their lifeblood–literally. “Embolization can block off blood supply to the fibroids,” explains Dr. Newsome. “The fibroids shrink and die.”

Your doctor will inject tiny particles into the arteries that supply blood to the fibroids. The particles set up a roadblock for any blood trying to get to the uterine fibroid. Uterine artery embolization can be done as either an inpatient or outpatient procedure.

Embolization is generally an option for women whose uterine fibroids are causing heavy bleeding or pain or whose fibroids are pushing on the bladder or rectum, but it’s not for you if you plan to get pregnant. “There are studies being done now to assess whether or not it’s safe to have this procedure and get pregnant,” says Dr. Kramer. It’s thought to weaken the walls of the uterus, he says, putting you at risk for complications during pregnancy.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *