The kids aren't alright

If you have endometriosis, when did your symptoms start? That can be a difficult question to answer as it probably wasn’t something that appeared overnight. A lot of the women I speak to found that their symptoms started when they were in their teens and gradually got worse. With endometriosis it’s never simple though, onset of symptoms is usually just the start of the journey. Often is it the case that symptoms, whilst clearly abnormal, are dismissed as trivial and the suffering continues; and it isn’t just the suffering, but the uncertainty. Despite being told otherwise, you know if there is something wrong with your body but no-one can tell you what it is. Diagnosis is one of the biggest hurdles to overcome for a great deal of women with endometriosis. Most of the sources of information on the subject put the average time to diagnosis at 7 to 9 years (although I met a woman once who told me it took her over 20 years to get diagnosed). You have to ask yourself, would people stand for this sort of delay for cancer diagnosis? Doubtful.

There are several factors at play to create these diagnostic delays; the symptoms of endometriosis can be varied and non-specific, endometriosis is hardly ever considered as the first explanation for the symptoms, and sadly a lot of women find it hard to get taken seriously (“some period pain is normal” being the mantra of the more obtuse members of the medical profession).

The good news is some research is being done to help reduce the diagnostic delay, particularly for young women. A recent study from France found that there were significant differences in the adolescent history of women with Deep Infiltrating Endometriosis (DIE). The study took 229 women who were being operated on for endometriosis and gave questionnaires to the 98 who were found to have DIE. These are the highlights of their findings, women with DIE during their adolescence had:
- Greater family history of endometriosis
- More absenteeism from school during menstruation
- Higher frequency and longer duration of oral contraceptive use before the age of 18
This information can therefore offer markers for DIE in young women. Training medical professionals to recognise these markers could therefore drastically reduce the diagnostic delay for DIE and increased the chances of successful treatment.

DIE is a particularly important type of endometriosis as it is one of, if not the most, painful form of the disease. Studies have shown that DIE has an increased number of nerve fibres present in the lesions which may explain their propensity for generating pain. Additionally, the different pain symptoms associated with DIE can often be explained by the location of the lesion (see the results section of this study http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12372446 ).

Oh, and I apologise for the lateness but I hope you all had a good holiday season and that 2011 is an excellent year for us all.