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What is uterine fibroid?
Fibroid is a tumour arising from the muscular wall of the womb. It is one of the most common tumours in human and is estimated to be present in about 20-30% of the women.
How do I know I have fibroids?
Depending on the size and location of the fibroids, there may or may not have any symptoms. Common complaints from fibroids are heavy periods, pain, pressure symptoms on the neighbouring when the fibroid is sizeable. Sometimes it can be associated with recurrent miscarriages and difficulty to conceive. Some of the fibroids produce no symptoms and are detected only at ultrasound or routine gynaecological examination.
What are the treatment options?
Not all fibroids need to be treated. Small fibroids that don’t cause any problems are best left alone. Those that are symptomatic, big, or growing in size need treatments.
Surgery is the mainstay of treatment, either removing the fibroids (myomectomy) or the entire womb (hysterectomy), if the condition is severe. Both of the procedures can be performed either thru the key hole techniques or videolaparoscopy, or the traditional open methods, depending on the doctors’ experience and training. Medical therapy mainly helps in controlling any heavy bleeding but is unable to shrink the fibroids permanently. Recently another treatment methods involving cutting off the blood supply of the fibroids without removing them are also available, and can be performed either laparoscopically or radiologically.
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