VIDEO: School program aims to cut diagnostic delay in endometriosis

VANCOUVER – Although symptoms can start young in endometriosis – sometimes in adolescence – women often suffer for years from bowel problems, pain, dyspareunia, and other complications before the condition is recognized and addressed.

Endometriosis can be “a monster of a disease,” especially if it’s not recognized early, said Deborah Bush, cofounder and CEO of the patient advocacy group Endometriosis New Zealand.

To help, she and her colleagues started an education program in New Zealand to teach secondary school students how to recognize – and seek help – when menstrual symptoms fall outside the norm.

In an interview at the World Congress on Endometriosis, Ms. Bush explained the importance of such efforts, and the impact they’ve had in New Zealand over the past 20 years (Aust N Z J Obstet Gynaecol. 2017 Mar 28. doi: 10.1111/ajo.12614).

She also gave an example from her own endometriosis consulting practice of what it took to turn around a patient who had been suffering with the disease for 15 years. Treatment had to move far beyond pelvic lesions.

[email protected]

VANCOUVER – Although symptoms can start young in endometriosis – sometimes in adolescence – women often suffer for years from bowel problems, pain, dyspareunia, and other complications before the condition is recognized and addressed.

Endometriosis can be “a monster of a disease,” especially if it’s not recognized early, said Deborah Bush, cofounder and CEO of the patient advocacy group Endometriosis New Zealand.

To help, she and her colleagues started an education program in New Zealand to teach secondary school students how to recognize – and seek help – when menstrual symptoms fall outside the norm.

In an interview at the World Congress on Endometriosis, Ms. Bush explained the importance of such efforts, and the impact they’ve had in New Zealand over the past 20 years (Aust N Z J Obstet Gynaecol. 2017 Mar 28. doi: 10.1111/ajo.12614).

She also gave an example from her own endometriosis consulting practice of what it took to turn around a patient who had been suffering with the disease for 15 years. Treatment had to move far beyond pelvic lesions.

[email protected]

VANCOUVER – Although symptoms can start young in endometriosis – sometimes in adolescence – women often suffer for years from bowel problems, pain, dyspareunia, and other complications before the condition is recognized and addressed.

Endometriosis can be “a monster of a disease,” especially if it’s not recognized early, said Deborah Bush, cofounder and CEO of the patient advocacy group Endometriosis New Zealand.

To help, she and her colleagues started an education program in New Zealand to teach secondary school students how to recognize – and seek help – when menstrual symptoms fall outside the norm.

In an interview at the World Congress on Endometriosis, Ms. Bush explained the importance of such efforts, and the impact they’ve had in New Zealand over the past 20 years (Aust N Z J Obstet Gynaecol. 2017 Mar 28. doi: 10.1111/ajo.12614).

She also gave an example from her own endometriosis consulting practice of what it took to turn around a patient who had been suffering with the disease for 15 years. Treatment had to move far beyond pelvic lesions.

[email protected]