Update on treatment of menstrual disorders

To the Editor: In their recent article on treatment of menstrual disorders, Hickey and Farquhar described three case scenarios to highlight alternative treatments for menstrual disorders.1

In Patient 1, a 39-year-old woman with dysfunctional uterine bleeding, the authors preferentially treated the patient with the levonorgestrel-releasing intrauterine system (20 μg per 24 h). Unfortunately, this device is available through the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme only for contraception, not treatment of menorrhagia. It would be difficult to explain to the government its use in this woman, who, according to the history, had had laparoscopic sterilisation. As a new intrauterine system has to be inserted every 5 years, and has a failure rate of 20% after 1 year, a 39-year-old woman would need at least another two inserted to control dysfunctional bleeding.

The optimum method of management would have been simple vaginal hysterectomy. This was not mentioned in the article, which contrasted the intrauterine system only with abdominal hysterectomy. The authors also claimed that “cost–benefit analysis showed that [the intrauterine system] Mirena was three times cheaper than hysterectomy”. This analysis should include the cost of three Mirenas ($260 each), insertion, doctors’ visits for Pap smears for 30 years, tampons and pads. Is this cheaper? After all, hysterectomy means no periods, pain, pregnancies, Pap smears or pads.

What is wrong with vaginal hysterectomy? The fact that the woman had had three caesarean sections and laparoscopic sterilisation was not a contraindication.2

Patient 2, a 45-year-old woman with menorrhagia and small fibroids, could also have been managed with vaginal hysterectomy.3 There is no evidence that hysteroscopic resection of fibroids in a multiple-fibroid uterus, as recommended by the authors, will improve menorrhagia. They also state that an alternative technique, embolisation, has been “widely used”. This technique is experimental and, as they state, “has been associated with serious side effects, such as infection, bowel obstruction and loss of ovarian function”, as well as death.4

In our quest for management innovations for women with dysfunctional bleeding, we should decide whether the new technique is better than the gold standard, hysterectomy. As hysterectomy can be vaginal, laparoscopic with vaginal assistance, totally laparoscopic, or abdominal, one cannot just use the word “hysterectomy”, one must specify. Studies reveal that the vaginal approach is superior.2,5