No woman needs to die of fibroids —Ajayi

Women in Nigeria diagnosed with fibroids and adenomyosis have been admonished not to suffer or die in silence but to take advantage of the significant advances in medical technology, such as high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU), that are available and accessible in the country.

Dr. Abayomi Ajayi, the CEO of the Fibroid Care Centre in Lagos, made this call during a My Period Stories Watch party themed “Fighting Fibroids: The Non-invasive Procedure,” organised by the Sanitary Pad Media Campaign in collaboration with the Fibroid Care Centre.

Ajayi said HIFU is an effective and specialised non-invasive procedure that utilises focused ultrasound waves to destroy fibroids without open surgery, the need for hospital admission, or blood transfusion.

According to him, “the world is moving from the invasive to the noninvasive treatment of fibroids for so many reasons. Figures from France, showed that 20 out of 100,000 people who surgery for fibroids had actually died, especially after hysterectomy. Then 2,000 out of 100,000 had problems after the surgery, from fever and blood transfusion to deep vein thrombosis (DVT).

“So the world is now looking more towards non-invasive methods, which will prevent all these things that can happen. With HIFU, there is no risk of blood loss, damage to organs, or tissue. It preserves fertility, and women are able to conceive and have normal pregnancies after treatment.

“HIFU takes away almost all the risks because we don’t cut at all, we don’t use anaesthesia, and rarely does anything go wrong, especially when you do everything the way it should be done.

“Also, the recurrence rate for fibroids after surgery is a little bit higher than HIFU. Even if there is a recurrence, and you need to do another HIFU, it’s still better than having to do another surgery.

“We are not saying everybody should do HIFU. What we’re trying to do is that, when you have fibroids, let’s look at all the options, and see you decide which one you think is best for you, depending on so many things, like the type of fibroids, its location, obesity, and certain medical history or previous surgeries.”

Convener of the Sanitary Pad Media Campaign, Anike Funke-Treasure, said the collaboration was to engender open dialogues about menstrual issues.

She said, “For too long, we’ve been silent about menstrual issues. We don’t want the silence to keep people from accessing treatment, from getting sound knowledge about what they’re going through. We know that many women are ashamed of menstruation, and because of the stigma that comes with menstruation, women are keeping a lot to their chest. It is affecting them from having a good quality of life.”

Funke-Treasure declared that fibroid is a common period disorder, and the experiences of many women that have had a hysterectomy, a surgical procedure to remove their womb as a cure for it, were very traumatic.

According to her, many women with fibroids are ignorant of the non-invasive procedure for its treatment, leaving them in fear of surgery and suffering in silence.

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