Study, 2015
Does treating the uterus with injections and freezing help severe PMS and PMDD?
Women in this study who received cervical injections and freezing showed very large improvements in their PMS and PMDD symptoms.
What they did
Reviewed medical records of 161 women (148 were analyzed) treated between 1995 and 2005. Treatment involved injections of antibiotic and anti-inflammatory medicine into the cervix, combined with freezing. Women rated 10 different PMS symptoms on a 0 to 5 scale before treatment and again 3 menstrual cycles after.
What they found
Before treatment, women's average symptom scores ranged from 2.13 to 4.51. After treatment, scores dropped to between 0.22 and 1.01. All 10 symptoms improved. The symptoms were depression, irritability, anxiety, fatigue, headache, swelling, breast tenderness, belly bloating, pelvic pain, and painful periods.
What it means for you
Women with severe PMS and PMDD had major symptom improvements after cervical injections and freezing. This suggests PMS might involve inflammation in the uterus. However, this was a small group treated over 10 years ago in one location. The results may not be the same for everyone, and this approach is still experimental.
148
Women analyzed in the study
10
Different symptoms measured
3
Menstrual cycles after treatment when symptoms were measured again
About the study
- Original title
- Is Premenstrual Syndrome a Uterine Inflammatory Disease? Retrospective Evaluation of an Etiologic Approach
- Authors
- Jorge Lolas-Talhami, Juana Lafaja-Mazuecos, Diego Ferrández-Sempere
- Journal
- Open Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology
- Year
- 2015
- Study design
- Study
- Participants
- 161
- What was tested
- Cervical injections of antibiotic and anti-inflammatory medication combined with freezing
- Open access
- Yes
- Read the paper
- doi.org/10.4236/ojog.2015.56044
Original abstract
Objective: To retrospectively evaluate the efficacy of local uterine antibiotic and anti-inflammatory injections combined with cryotherapy for the treatment of severe Premenstrual Syndrome (PMS) and Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD). To validate the hypothesis of a uterine infectious/inflammatory etiology of PMS/PMDD. Methods: Clinical files of 161 women sequentially treated from September 1995 to April 2005, were collected for study. A subset of 148 patients (mean: 36.7 ± 7.8 years, range: 20.1 - 53.8 years) were eligible for statistical analysis. The ten most relevant PMS symptoms, namely depression, irritability, anxiety, fatigue, headache, edema, breast tenderness, abdominal bloating, pelvic pain and dysmenorrhea, were self-rated before and three menstrual cycles after treatment, using a 0 to 5 scale. The treatment consisted of cervical stromal antibiotic/anti-inflammatory injections combined with intracervical cryotherapy. Scores were compared using non-parametric tests for matched samples. Results: Before treatment, mean severity scores for the 10 symptoms were 3.97 ± 1.17, 4.26 ± 0.88, 3.41 ± 1.23, 3.91 ± 0.94, 3.35 ± 1.71, 2.28 ± 1.69, 2.13 ± 1.63, 4.51 ± 0.63, 2.28 ± 1.30, and 2.28 ± 1.88, respectively. Mean values after treatment were 0.54 ± 0.91, 0.51 ± 0.91, 0.32 ± 0.70, 0.42 ± 0.74, 0.43 ± 0.96, 0.22 ± 0.53, 0.39 ± 0.73, 1.01 ± 0.94, 0.28 ± 0.69, and 0.44 ± 0.92. All tests were statistically significant (p < 0.01). Conclusion: Both PMS physical and psycho-affective symptoms respond to local anti-inflammatory and antibiotic treatment of the uterus, showing a stable improvement after the treatment has ended. The results of this study suggest that the clinical pattern of PMS can be explained as an inflammatory mediated response to uterine infectious or traumatic insults. Further evidence is urgently needed in order to validate this innovative approach for widespread use in severe PMS/ PMDD cases.
Reproduced under CC-BY.
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