Uterine Fibroid Embolization

10 Advantages of Embolization

1. It’s safe.
   At least a million women, worldwide, have been successfully treated
2. It’s simple.
   Most procedures take about half an hour
3. It’s cost effective.
   No lengthy hospital stays or the fees that come with them
4. Symptom relief is immediate.
   Pain, heavy bleeding, anemia, fatigue will end with embolization
5. No hospital stay.
   This is an out-patient treatment
6. No cutting.
   With embolization there are no scalpels, sutures or scarring
7. No ‘going under’.
   You won’t be exposed to the risks of general anesthetic
8. Less downtime.
   Most patients return to work in a matter of days
9. No recurrence.
   Fibroids don’t return, as they often do with surgeries like myomectomy
10. Keep your fertility.
    There’s no trauma to, or removal of, the uterus

If you’re interested in having children, fibroid embolization makes good sense. A hysterectomy obviously ends any chance of getting pregnant. Fibroid surgeries like myomectomy may cause uterine scarring and impact the ability conceive. 50% of all myomectomy patients experience fibroid regrowth. The window for having a fibroid-free uterus, optimal for pregnancy, is often less than a year.

Fibroid embolization preserves fertility. It won’t interfere with the womb or remove any of its tissue. There’s no fibroid re-growth, so you can get pregnant when you are ready, rather than racing against a fibroid re-occurrence.

Fibroid embolization means that patients of child-bearing age who want to conceive, generally can. Over 80 women in our practice have had normal pregnancies and healthy babies following this procedure.

Hear from patients who had children after embolization…

Embolization isn’t surgery. Recovery time is much, much shorter. Your body won’t have to heal from the trauma of large surface incisions, tissue removal or even the effects of general anesthetic. As a result, most patients are on their feet in 24 hours and feeling normal enough to return to regular life and work within about 4 days.

A major difference between fibroid embolization and traditional fibroid surgeries (like myomectomy) is that embolization ensures fibroids can never grow back. Fibroids removed surgically often leave enough fibroid cells and fibroid tissue to eventually regenerate. 50% of the time, women who have myomectomies discover their fibroids are back in less than a year.

Fibroid embolization stops the blood supply carrying oxygen and nutrients to the fibroid, without a blood supply, fibroids can’t live, grow or reoccur.

Embolization stops fibroid-related pain and excessive bleeding instantly. While it will take a few months for the fibroids to completely shrink, most prominent symptoms associated with fibroid discomfort are gone immediately after the procedure. Once fibroids are deprived of a blood supply, they stop growing and starve. As they shrink, so will fibroid-related abdomen ‘bloat’.

So Simple. Fibroid embolization shrinks fibroids instead of surgically removing them. It involves one tiny incision. Nothing is cut or removed from the body. The average procedure takes less than 30 minutes. Most patients recover in a few days.

So Safe. Embolization is a medical term that refers to the blocking of blood vessels using tiny micro-particles. Embolization has been used by surgeons for over 50 years to stop unexpected or uncontrolled bleeding. In the early 90’s, a doctor in France noticed when blood vessels in the uterus were embolized to halt bleeding after childbirth or during surgery, fibroids in the embolized area significantly shrank.

The Fibroid Treatment Collective introduced fibroid embolization to America in 1994. We have successfully treated over 6,000 patients.

Read more about the history of embolization