According to government statistics, about 20 million American women have had a hysterectomy; the surgical removal of the uterus.

Very often, doctors recommend hysterectomy to women who suffer from uterine fibroids. But now, thanks to a growing field of medicine, there’s an alternative to hysterectomy.

Fibroids are non-cancerous tumors. They’re usually not a problem. But sometimes, they can seriously affect a woman’s health and well-being.

“Many patients will have very long and very heavy periods to where they feel they can’t go out of the house. It’s really debilitating,” said Dr. Patricia Stoltzfus, WVU Interventional Radiologist. “And fibroids can grow quite large and cause pressure symptoms. They can grow as large as a five-month-old fetus.”

When fibroid symptoms are this extreme, doctors often call for hysterectomy. But this radical step can often be prevented with a procedure called Uterine Fibroid Embolization.

A catheter is inserted through an artery to the uterus.

“…and then we inject tiny little particles which go into the fibroid and block the blood flow to the fibroid; and the fibroid dies and starts to shrink,” Stoltzfus said. “And if the patient had symptoms of bleeding, that stops almost immediately or within one cycle.”

Uterine Fibroid Embolization is performed only by doctors who specialize in interventional radiology. Fibroid embolization has an excellent success rate. It’s less invasive and less painful.

“Hospitalization is much shorter,” added Stoltzfus. “They’re only kept overnight for uterine fibroid embolization, where hysterectomy might be three or four days. So recovery time is much shorter.”

The article is from here.

There is also a corresponding video, from here:

Uterine fibroid embolization may be a good way for you too, but it is somewhat more difficult to come by, since you will be needing an interventional radiologist. You can also see other non-invasive techniques described on this site, such as Reiki, homeopathy, Su Jok, medical astrology and several others.

Here’s a comparative study, with the full name of

Uterine artery embolisation or hysterectomy for the treatment of symptomatic uterine fibroids: a cost-utility analysis of the HOPEFUL study

by Wu, O. and Briggs, A.H. and Dutton, S. and Hirst, A. and Maresh, M. and Nicholson, A. and McPherson, K. (2007), and published in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology 114(11):pp. 1352-1362.

They wanted to see which procedure should be favourized from the standpoint of UK NHS. There were 649 women who underwent UAE (Uterine Artery Embolisation) and were followed for the 8.6 years in average, while there were 459 women with hysterectomy, which were followed for up to 4.6 in average.

Two main measures were the Costs of procedures and complications, and Quality Adjusted Life Years (QALY) UAE had the lower cost, £2536 versus £3282, small reduction in quality of life (8.203 versus 8.241 QALYs) when compared with hysterectomy. However, when the quality of life associated with the conservation of the uterus was incorporated in the model, UAE was shown to be the dominant strategy—lower costs and greater QALYs.

The result of the study is that simply more women should be allowed to UAE instead of going directly to hysterectomy. This is especially important if the woman wants to preserve her uterus.

The abstract of the Uterine Artery Embolisation or Hysterectomy For the Treatment of Symptomatic Uterine Fibroids study is published by the University of Glasgow.