Question about a medical condition

leslie :-D · May 12, 2004

well, it certainly sounds ominous. i'm not going to guess any medical conditions but when a doctor requests someone to accompany her, it doesn't sound good.

Jolie, BSN · May 12, 2004

A 23 y/o girl who drinks alot and possibly does drugs, has a miscarriage. She doesn't think she can even get pregnant because after her son was born, she too the Depo-provera shot,and it "supposedly" dried up her uterus (in her words). Her son at his time was 5.
She went to a Dr, who wanted to give a her medication to rid her body of this tissue, she wouldn't follow through. This happened in November 2002.
Fast forward to her son being 6 (almost 7) and her having intense stomach pain almost constantly. She has a large lump in her abdominal area, and 2-3 others, smaller in size. She bleeds almost daily and has been doing this for almost 6 months now... (This is April 2004) and she has went to a Dr and had a laparoscopy done.
For 17 months she carried dead tissue around in her body. The last I heard, the Dr will tell her her test results on Monday, and has requested that she bring someone with her to the appointment.
Can someone please tell me what they think is going on? The girl has always been "free" with sexual favors and has been (may still be) quite the drinker and (possibly) drugs.
Could the tissue have turned cancerous? AIDS? And usually it is something terrible is when the Dr wants someone with her, right? Or am I reading something into this that's not there?
Do you think her son is going to have to grow up without her?
Give me opinions as to what you think this may be (other than a young girls stupidity)....
Thank you all, I value your opinions....
and yes, this is a serious and true story.

First of all, Depo does not "dry up the uterus". It prevents the uterine lining from building up and shedding. If she took it for a prolonged period of time, (it must be repeated every 3 months to be effective for contraception) it may be that her periods did not return promptly once it was DC'd, leading her to believe that she couldn't get pregnant. It sounds like she did not have a D&C after her miscarriage. Since the doctor wanted to give her medication to "rid her body of this tissue", I suspect that he believed that she had retained some fetal or placental tissue, and was recommending a "chemical D&C. If she retained fetal or placental tissue, I would have expected her to have had bleeding problems and s/s of infection long before now. There is the possibility of pelvic inflammatory disease, but that doesn't really fit her symptoms. Her current complaints of abdominal masses and bleeding are very concerning, and leave me to wonder about the possibility of cervical, ovarian or uterine cancer. She certainly needs support. Best wishes to her.

SharkLPN · May 12, 2004

Don't discount benign fibroids or endometriosis (or a combo of both) causing the bleeding and pain. Regardless of the diagnosis, the doctor might be recommending a TAH/BSO as treatment, and that might explain having someone accompany her to the appointment. She's very young to get the news that she may have to have a hysterectomy. My thoughts are with her.

ChrisA · May 12, 2004

TAH/BSO? Help me out.

OneChattyNurse · May 12, 2004

TAH = Total abd. Hysterectomy

BSO = bilat salpingo oopherectomy (removal of bilat ovaries)

This certainly does sound scary. Hopefully, as another poster said, it is the hysterectomy and not something worse!