Hope for women with pelvic pain!
Adenomyosis is a condition that can have overlapping symptoms with endometriosis. It’s hard to say how many women are suffering from adonomyosis at any one time. Like with endometriosis it is necessary to see the glands and supporting structures in the muscle of the uterus to accurately assess this. This article from endometriosisaustralia.org talks about the cause, symptoms and treatment for adonomyosis… Read More
As part of the series “The Pelvis Is A Busy Place” at the PTWA annual meeting for Washington State’s top physical therapists, Dr. Mosbrucker gave a lecture on chronic pelvic pain… Read More
Interventions that enhance resilience Download complete PDF Resilience – the ability to recover quickly from difficulties. A skill that can be learned by those with chronic illness, including chronic pain. Identify individual character strengths and promote their use in regular and novel ways. Strengths such as hope, kindness, social intelligence, self-control and perspective buffer against the effects of stress, trauma and physical pain. Learn your character strengths www.viacharacter.org/Survey/Account/Register Keeping a Gratitude Diary Every day, write down 3 things for which … Read More
Endometriosis, frequently referred to as just “endo”, is a genetic disease that affects women and causes pain, inflammation, and infertility. The severity of pain varies from person to person, just as the severity of disease does, however they are not linked. What this means is that one person may have mild disease and severe pain, whereas someone else could have severe disease and minimal symptoms. This has led physicians and researchers to call endometriosis “enigmatic”, meaning perplexing or mysterious. In … Read More
What is excision of endometriosis and why is it different? Let’s take a step back and look at the history of surgical approaches to endometriosis. Way back in the dark ages before laparoscopy and lasers, all surgery consisted of cutting a patient open and removing their disease. This approach has been used to treat endometriosis since the 1800s, and a prominent gynecologic surgeon, Dr. Joe Meigs wrote in the 1950s about excision: “…recurrence is not frequent, and cure…by conservative surgery … Read More
I view patients who come to me with pelvic pain as a puzzle of sorts. Something is causing pain, and it’s my job to figure out what, and solve the puzzle. After specializing in endometriosis and pelvic pain for over 10 years now, most of the time the puzzle is easily solved, but some patients are very challenging and can take some time to figure out what is truly the root cause of their pain. The quality of pain (sharp, … Read More
Interstitial Cystitis (IC), also called Painful Bladder Syndrome (PBS), is a disease syndrome characterized by pain in the region of the bladder, along with urgency, and frequency in the context of sterile, uninfected urine. The diagnosis is made by symptoms and exam, without needing any other tests such as cystoscopy or hydrodistension. Symptoms Classic symptoms of IC include pelvic pain, especially with a full bladder, urgency, frequency, and pain with intercourse, but over time, the pain can become more constant. … Read More
One of the most painful manifestations of Deeply Infiltrating Endometriosis is that involving the gastrointestinal tract, or the bowels. We don’t know the exact proportion of women with endo who have bowel disease, but in specialized practices it can be up to 30% of endometriosis patients. Intestinal endometriosis can cause a variety of symptoms depending on where on the bowel it is (small bowel, colon, appendix, etc). The most common site on the bowel is the rectosigmoid colon – the … Read More
This is a lecture that I gave along with my general surgeon buddy Dr. Linda Pai in 2015 at the “Multidisciplinary Approach to Pelvic Pain” conference that I chaired. Since it’s just the powerpoint slides, there’s not a ton of explanation, but there are a lot of citations of the scientific literature that explains why excision of endo is the best treatment option we have in 2016. This is essentially the scientific proof along with the article “The Cost Effectiveness … Read More
Unpublished Scientific Article Cindy M Mosbrucker MD David B Redwine MD Private practice 2190 NE Professional Court Bend, Oregon 97701 541-382-8622 Funding: none Synopsis The age-stratified laterality of distribution of endometriosis refutes the peritoneal circulation modification of the theory of reflux menstruation as the origin of endometriosis. Abstract Objective: To tabulate the frequencies of involvement of left and right sided uterosacral and ovarian endometriosis in age-group intervals. Design: Retrospective review of contemporaneously-tabulated data. Setting: Tertiary international referral practice specializing in … Read More