| HOPE FOR FIBROIDS | ||||||||||||||||||
|
|
“WHAT IS THE ANSWER TO MY UTERINE FIBROID QUESTION?” A PATIENT ASKS HER INTERVENTIONAL RADIOLOGIST AND GYNECOLOGIST
Is green tea good for its antioxidant
qualities to combat tumors?
Do you recommend your patients drink green tea before or after UAE or use
other alternative medicines (vitamin/herbal treatments)? I generally
do not recommend any herbal therapies. There is little or no good
scientific data on the usefulness of these therapies. While most are
harmless, there are some herbal therapies which may even be harmful. I do not
need to have anemia corrected before UAE. Anemia has to be corrected
before surgery because there may be significant blood loss. However, there
is essentially no blood loss with UAE. I have to date never had to
transfuse a patient before or after UAE.
Will uterine fibroids go away by themselves?
After
menopause a woman no longer has circulating estrogen, so fibroids will
decrease in size and severity.
However, Hormone Replacement Therapy may supply enough estrogen to
keep fibroids going in some women.
Before menopause, uterine fibroids will not go away by themselves.
There is no need to have a sonogram for fibroids so small that MRI can’t clearly identify them. Fibroids do not require treatment unless they cause symptoms. They are not the kind of tumor where a “preemptive strike” is useful. If you have fibroids and no symptoms then the fibroids are not significant to your health. - Francis L. Hutchins, Jr., M.D.
Can you live with uterine fibroids or must
you always have them removed? In general,
if the fibroids are not causing any symptoms they require no therapy.
Calcification is the natural fate of
fibroids. It is normal for a fibroid to calcify after infarcting (whether
after menopause or after UAE). The simple presence of a calcified fibroid
is not an indication for any treatment. If there are still symptoms,
then the patient should discuss the issue with her IR.
How
long has Uterine Artery Embolization been performed in the United States?
One of the most effective
treatments for bleeding is to stop the blood supply to the area that is
bleeding by blocking the vessels from the inside, this is
known as “embolization.”
Embolization of the arteries to the uterus has been used as a
treatment for severe uterine bleeding after surgery or childbirth since at
least the late 1970s.
Uterine Artery Embolization (UAE) was first used as a treatment for
fibroids in France in the late 1980’s/early 1990’s and the first
report was published in Lancet
in 1995. Drs. Goodwin (IR)
and McLucas (Gyn) started performing UAE for fibroids in Los Angeles in
the first quarter of 1996.
Dr. Francis Hutchins, Jr.,
a Gynecologist associated with Dr.
Kirsch, saw an article by Dr. McLucas and asked me to perform UAE
in the second half of 1996.
UAE has an extensive track record of
safety and efficacy for other causes of bleeding. When I started to offer UAE there
was already more than five years experience in France with treatment
of fibroids by UAE.
There is some evidence that St Johns
Wort and Echinacea may make bleeding worse after an invasive procedure. I
generally ask patients to stop taking these preparations several days
before the UAE.
|
|
||||||||||||||||
