July 2013

Lupron and Endometriosis

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Leuprolide, more commonly known as Lupron, is promoted within the gynecological field as one of the best options for treating endometriosis. Lupron is also used for men with prostate cancer and children going through precocious puberty. Endometriosis is a secondary autoimmune disease where the lining of the uterus (the endometrium) grows outside of the uterus, breaking down and bleeding in conjunction with a woman’s regular menstrual cycle. The displaced endometrium, having no way of leaving the body causes scarring, cysts, internal bleeding, chronic pain and infertility.  There is currently no cure for endometriosis. Current treatments include laproscopic surgery, oral contraceptives, partial or complete hysterectomy and GnRH agonists such as Lupron.

What is Lupron?

Lupron in a GnRH agonist which puts the female into a chemically induced state of menopause and is often associated with serious side-effects. According to Dr. David Redwine, a gynecologist with over 30 years of experience treating endometriosis, “The state of menopause with Lupron is very unnatural, not only because it is chemically induced with medicines, but because FSH levels are not elevated as they are in normal menopause. Lupron temporarily stops menstruation but does nothing to eradicate endometriosis from the woman’s body.”  What Lupron does do is suppress the body’s pituitary-gonadal system potentially causing an onslaught of endocrine, neural and immune side-effects.

Side Effects

While this list is not all inclusive, it does however, include many of the more commonly reported side effects of Lupron: 

  • fatigue
  • hot flashes
  • depression
  • insomnia
  • joint pain
  • decreased bone density
  • loss of sex drive
  • vaginal dryness
  • loss of appetite
  • weight gain
  • nausea
  • changes in bowel patterns
  • acne
  • facial hair growth
  • increased body hair growth
  • breakthrough bleeding
  • dizziness
  • night sweats
  • chills
  • muscle pain
  • overall feeling of physical weakness
  • stomach pain
  • constipation
  • diarrhea
  • vaginal itching and/or discharge
  • breast swelling or tenderness
  • memory problems
  • changes in urinary control
  • skin redness and itching
  • headaches
  • blurred vision
  • diabetes
  • convulsions
  • hair loss
  • anemia
  • fibromyalgia like symptoms
  • hyperglycemia
  • ECG changes

The Lupron and Endometriosis Connection

Given the general lack of knowledge and sparsity of endometriosis specialists – it almost makes sense that a drug that stops menstruation and induces a hormonal standstill, would be effective in treating endometriosis – almost.  However, Lupron does not cure endometriosis nor does it effectively treat endometriosis.  What it does cause is a host of painful side effects which can last long after the drug’s maximum 6 month dosage.

As a co-founder of Endo Warriors, a support group for women with endometriosis, I have spoken to countless women with endometriosis who have been prescribed Lupron for their endometriosis.  Of these women, I have never heard one say that taking Lupron either helped their symptoms or provided any decreased endometriosis progression. Instead I have heard several stories of women developing thyroid disease, women experiencing hot flashes and breakthrough bleeding as painful as if they were menstruating, women in their late twenties coming off Lupron with bone densities resembling those of women in their late sixties, and stories of developing fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue.

Despite the adverse consequences of Lupron being known within the Lupron-prescribed portion of the endometriosis community, the dissemination of that knowledge generally stops there. In fact, there are plenty of websites that describe endometriosis as a common and treatable reproductive disease – going on to cite Lupron as not only an effective but an optimal treatment. While endometriosis is indeed common, with 176 million sufferers worldwide, it is not easily treatable.  And unfortunately, none of those 176 million women will see a cure until some honest dialogue take places regarding the challenges in treating endometriosis and credible evidence regarding the safety and efficacy of Lupron and other prescribed treatments for endometriosis is available.

Lupron Side Effects Survey

To determine the rate, range and scope of side-effects associated with Lupron use in women’s health,  Lucine and Hormones Matter are conducting an online survey: The Lupron Side Effects Survey. The survey is anonymous and takes only 15 minutes to complete. If you are woman who has ever been prescribed Lupron, please take a few minutes to complete the survey. Your data will give other women the information they need to make a decision about Lupron.

 

 

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Adhesions – the Pain, Suffering and Frustration

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Roxie Fiste

My personal struggles with adhesions began shortly after a partial hysterectomy at age 33. Our daughter was just a toddler but there would be no more babies now that my uterus, riddled with growing tumors, had been removed.  For over a year I had fought with my body, suffering with double menstrual cycles, pain, even having contractions as my body thought I was pregnant again!  It took five pregnancy tests to prove to the doctors that I didn’t have a tube pregnancy going on.  The first surgeon I had tried to save my uterus but the fibroids had grown inside as well as through its walls.  He carefully cleaned off the endometriosis gathered around my ovaries believing they would function normally after surgery.  It took about six weeks, but my energy levels eventually picked up to the point I actually felt good again.

My husband gave me a membership to a nearby health center as my healing process was ending. Being a full time mother and housewife did keep me very busy so working out gave me a couple of hours a week to clear my mind. Don’t get me wrong, I loved being a new mom, watching our daughter grow and change each day, but those few hours were greatly energizing. Eventually, I was even able to return to a little stargazing in late evenings after our daughter would go to bed. Life seemed to actually return to normal.

Six months later something began happening to the Me inside. Outwardly, I was unchanged, but emotionally and mentally I was becoming lost.  The feelings were strange, frightening, as the real me seemed to drift off into the distance. It was after a rigorous workout that I felt something flopping around in my lower abdomen. It wasn’t painful until my GYN did a check which nearly caused me to pass out. Another surgery was scheduled which resulted in my left ovary, the size of a small orange, being removed. The surgeon reassured me that once I healed everything would be “normal” again.  He had cleaned up my right ovary and removed some tiny adhesions. Life improved for about a month. For six months after that I began experiencing mood shifts, panic attacks, night sweats and two episodes of convulsions. My GP sent me to see a specialist to see if anything could be done for my mental state. This new doctor immediately set up an appointment with my GYN again. Something was physically wrong with me which was causing a disruption in my emotional and mental states.  Surgery was once again scheduled. This time the doctor found endometriosis, adhesions and a dead ovary.  After its removal I was placed on estrogen which completely righted the mental and emotional states. My family thought I was home free!

While working out about seven months after my previous surgery, I felt a burning sensation deep in my lower back. I tried various exercises, massage, whatever would help my back improve. Nothing worked. It became a rather tedious nightmare just trying to do laundry, chase a toddler, cook a meal, etc.!  How frustrating to have the deep, fiery pain continue to spread from my back to all the way around my lower abdomen!  Someone we visited suggested it might be adhesions. She suggested that I go back to my GYN. By the time this fourth surgery came I could barely stand up straight.  It had gotten hard to breathe and I could no longer sing in the choir.  My surgeon found so many adhesions a laser could not be used. It took him 45 minutes to remove the enormous number of adhesions using a scalpel. He was worn out and frustrated by the way my body was producing them so before closing me up he placed special mesh along my abdominal wall, while trying to protect my intestines. To complete his attempt he added small implants of cortisone pellets into the areas covered by the mesh.  Upon waking after this particular surgery I was quite nauseous.  Multiple muscle spasms hit within hours of coming out of the anesthesia as well. The nurses were quite good at keeping me set up with Phenergan and piroxicam! One stopped the nausea and the other stopped the muscle spasms. It was not my normal way of dealing with pain – I preferred to take a couple of Tylenol 3’s, not injections of strong meds. Thankfully, after a couple of days in the hospital I went back to taking tablets instead of shots. My breathing returned to normal as well as the ability to take deep breaths to sing within a few days of surgery. This time my husband and I fully believed my life would get back on track.

For about a year I remained free of adhesions, going about normal activities, mommyhood, spontaneous adventures with my family.  Within weeks of the anniversary of that last surgery the ring of fire returned. This is what my GYN called the ring of adhesions rapidly growing in my body. Over the next ten years I would have six more surgeries for adhesions. There were years I barely weighed 84 lbs before surgery. Other times I weighed as much as 105 lbs – my body just couldn’t adjust to the physical intrusions of the scar tissue.

In 2002 I had what would be my very last surgery for adhesions.  There were a couple of complications which made healing more challenging – a hematoma in my abdomen caused searing pain and a near double surgery, (thankfully a specialist released me saying the hematoma would resolve on its own), and a serious bout with Epstein-Barr virus slowed healing to a snail’s pace.  It took over a year to recover from the EBV.  Looking back it is quite clear that my immune system was worn down, plus my vitamin D3 levels were very low, most likely from all of the surgeries I had starting, with my first surgery mid-pregnancy through 2002. Twelve altogether – not a world record, but definitely ENOUGH!

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176 Million Reasons

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I have a disease which cannot be described-
Its symptoms vary and its cause is unknown;
Doctors routinely mistreat it to the dismay
Of 176 million women worldwide.

As women we are captive to this farce.
The promised cure an enigma, a cruel mirage.
Young girls not yet women left hollow,
Emptied of their organs, told to smile wider.

We find that diagnosis leads merely
To more confusion. There is no
Medical consensus. We are sheep,
Dosed and herded, penned together.

We are the women that doctors fear,
we stumble in crying, we live with pain.
Nobody wants us to say what we need.
The stigma is worse than the disease.

 

Lisa GrahamLisa lives in Homer Alaska with her amazing husband, and is an advocate for endometriosis awareness, education, and higher standards for women’s health worldwide.  She works in Quality Assurance, and she dreams of saving the world with poetry and organic vegetables.  She is currently pursuing a Master’s Degree in Project Management. 

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Endometriosis and Adhesions

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In 2007 when I was finally Diagnosed with Stage IV Endometriosis I wasn’t expecting anything but “a diagnosis”.

When I spoke to the attendee after my surgery she said that there was massive scar tissue from a previous bowel surgery I had when I was seven years old. It had worked its way all the way up to under my ribcage. It took an hour to just cut that all down and that was just part of my Endo surgery.

My entire pelvis was frozen solid with adhesions. Everything was wrapped around my uterus including both of my ovaries (kissing ovaries). To this day I always find it funny that through the 10 or so ultrasounds and transvaginal ultrasounds they kept saying they saw my ovaries with “certainty,” even though each time I watched them struggle to find them.

From 2010-2012, I spent the years protesting adhesions on my bowels and bladder causing painful sex, bowel movements and urination. I went back to my surgeon at least three times. My surgeon told me I was fine and there was no endometriosis. Then on the next visit he said there was fluid in the cul-de-sac and told me to take Lupron. He said, if it goes away its Endo, if not then it’s not Endo. I went back a month later with no change in the pain but he didn’t do another ultrasound to see if the fluid was still there. He just said “It’s not Endo, its Neuropathic Pain Syndrome.” Needless to say I told him off and got an appointment with the Wasser Pain Management Clinic in Toronto. The doctor wanted to try me on different meds. (I was on Visanne which made me suicidal, gave me chest, neck and back acne and severe abdominal pain and Amitriptyline which made me really groggy, crave carbs and gain weight). She wanted to switch me to Gabapentin to see if it would make a difference. None of the medications help. If anything, the meds they gave me made my symptoms worse.

By the time I made it to the pain clinic, I was doing three enemas a week just to have a bowel movement and to not be in pain. I had a another colonoscopy and as usual it showed no signs of anything. They told me my pain was IBS and Endo. I had all the signs of interstitial cysititis (IC) but the cystoscopy showed no signs of inflammation in the bladder. So again the wait continued. I was peeing in my pants because I had no sensation to pee at times, then other times the pain was so intense I would vomit and when I made it to the toilet I couldn’t pee. The pain was out of this world.  It was interfering with my life and job in a big way because I couldn’t go anywhere if I wasn’t near a toilet in seconds. I was peeing 60+ times a day at this point.

December 2012 the Gyne at the Wasser Clinic finally agreed to do the surgery. I was told she would remove my left ovary and both tubes. Since I was no longer looking to have children, if things went wrong she would open me up and remove it all.  I was OK with that. I signed off on that.

When I woke up I wasn’t in a lot of pain like my last surgery and I got very little details from my attendee. I had to wait six weeks to see my surgeon and to get my results.  I was told there was Endo in the cul-de sac, adhesions on my right side on the bowels causing a partial bowel obstruction and my right ovary was embedded in the pelvic wall and she left it there. On the other side the ovary was attached to the uterus by adhesions and the uterus stuck to the sigmoid colon by adhesions. Nothing was removed like I was told, so I was extremely confused.

At my six week appointment she said she ran into difficulties with the density of the adhesions covering the ureter and ovary that was embedded into the pelvic wall and said it was too dangerous to remove unless she opened me up…Umm did I not agree to that before I went in? rrrrr. She said my uterus was nicked with a tool and I was bleeding out but they managed to stop the bleed.

Later, after not being happy with what she told me, I took to Facebook and asked Dr. Redwine some things about my results. He mentioned that the giant cell found on my bladder flap that was biopsied was carbon residue from the laser used in 2007. He said it acts as a splinter so that might explain the painful peeing and all the other issues I had with my bladder.

Right now, after undergoing two endometriosis surgeries, I feel the major battle moving forward will always be the adhesions that seem to grow like wildfire in me. A hysterectomy would not stop the adhesions, so it is something that I still have in the back of my mind but don’t think I will pursue unless 100% necessary.

There are many therapies for adhesions, infertility and endometriosis. One of them is Clear Passage Therapy, however, I don’t live in the US and I can’t afford the treatments but I understand that they have very high success rates.

My only other option right now is Yamuna body rolling. You roll on the ball slowly to break up adhesions. I know many women who have had surgeries and swear by this technique. This is why I have considered it. I am a work in progress and I don’t know what is next. It’s a watch and wait game for now.

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Progress in Endometriosis

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New ideas take hold slowly in medicine, unfortunately.  A former assistant professor of neurology at Stanford once told Dr. David Redwine, the father of Modern Concepts in Endometriosis Care, it will take 30 years for your ideas to take hold.  What I did not understand is, taking hold does not mean conversion.

So the ideas developed in Modern Concepts, are taking hold. There are somewhere less than 100 gynecological surgeons who have been identified as doing effective endometriosis surgery in the US.  A Texas surgeon, John Dulemba MD, thinks maybe that is true worldwide.

Is this means for despair?  Well, yes if you are a person needing skilled removal of your endo. On the other hand, 30 years ago there was one doctor identified as doing skilled excision. Shortly others began showing interest in finding better outcomes for their patients.

I once had a discussion with Spence Meighan MD, the Director of Medical Education at Good Samaritan Hospital and Medical Center in Portland Oregon, about why doctors embraced new ideas so slowly.  One observation he had was that, only half of what we teach medical students in medical schools was accurate. The biggest issue is that we do not know which half.  We should be teaching more art of medicine and science of inquiry.  Not assuming as they come out of medical school they are now prepared to practice medicine. What they are prepared for is to begin to listen, look, inquire and research what they are unsure about.

Other reasons endo excision has been slow to become main stream are many.  For one, if you have a busy Ob/Gyn practice, taking hours per case in the OR plays havoc with office and surgery and delivery schedules.  A surgeon simply does not have the time in a general Ob/Gyn practice to take the time for each endometriosis case that removal of disease requires.

Another reason could be if gynecologists are not keeping up with the literature, they still see excision of endo as “out there”.  My sister-in-law recently went to a doctor who mentioned endometriosis to her and that if so she would need a hysterectomy.  When she asked about excision, the response was that is fringe therapy.  “Fringe Therapy”?  Well, if you have multiple laparoscopies, multiple medical therapies, been told to get pregnant, then told you need a hysterectomy and none of that worked?  Tell me which is fringe therapy?

So this leads to another reason excision may be slow to be embraced.  If you take care of endo in one or two surgeries, (Meigs, Redwine, Albee, Sinervo, Robbins, all have positive outcomes in one or two surgeries), then the loss of income from repeated laparoscopies, office prescribed medical therapies, pregnancies, and hysterectomies trying to treat endo becomes significant.  On the other hand, if you move away from scarcity thinking, and realize we have over 8.5 million women in North America needing effective surgery and over 176 million worldwide, there is no scarcity of patients needing effective surgery.  It becomes a huge opportunity and it is quite gratifying as well, because patients do so well as surgeons ability to find, and remove disease results in very happy patients.

Endometriosis pain is on par with acute appendicitis.  Patients develop peritoneal signs and symptoms, (bloating, acute abdominal pain, nausea, quiet bowel, sweating, paleness, sometimes fever, anxiety etc etc) something every medical student and nursing student has been well educated to look for in patients.  But in endo patients we can somehow say, “oh it’s just her period”.  If you think about the degree of pain associated with peritoneal inflammation, the least we can do is be sure that the patient has adequate pain relief until disease can be resolved.

What we fail to recognize in untreated endometriosis, is that this disease restricts potential, sexuality, child bearing, ability to work in many cases, and general constricts life down.  I have seen many, many women permanently relieved of their pain through excision of painful implants.  Returning to life as a sexual being, working woman, new mother often, they soar as never previously thought to be possible.  They are very grateful people.

It is unconscionable that we turn patients with acute abdominal pain away to suffer without assistance.  We would not do that to someone suffering pain from organ perforation, blunt abdominal trauma, or appendicitis.  The mechanism (inflamed peritoneum) is the same, relief of pain should be comparable.  Chronic use of pain medicine does not lead to abuse, it leads to relief, perhaps enough relief that she can get off the couch and turn the heating pad off.

Endometriosis is not a fatal disease, however, despair can be.

 

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Are Safer Vaccines Possible?

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Vaccine safety

Perhaps, but only if we can admit that some vaccines cause injury and rework the entire vaccine development and monitoring system.

Vaccine Safety

Vaccine safety is a controversial topic, almost as controversial as politics or religion. In polite company, it is best not to bring up the subject, lest an all-out shouting match ensue.  On the one side, we have the pro-vaccine camp, who believes wholeheartedly that every vaccine is necessary and safe – ‘why else would they be on the market?’ is a common refrain. On the other, the anti-vaccine crowd, who for various reasons, are against vaccines. Some among the anti-vaxers are fundamentally against all vaccines as a matter of religious or libertarian principle. In their eyes, vaccination represents the worst of big government subjugation. It is an attack on their very freedom. Others in the anti-vax crowd come to their views experientially, through injury or tragedy.  Somewhere in the middle, the rest of us, parents, scientists, doctors and health advocates who are neither for nor against vaccines in principle, but who just want our kids to be safe and healthy.

Beyond For or Against

Much like the polarization of politics, the polarization of the vaccine safety and efficacy, all but nullifies reasoned concerns. One is either for or against vaccines. There is no grey area. This is fantastic for vaccine manufacturers because every concern, every injury can be written off by simply de-legitimizing the claimant – placing them in the nutty anti-vax camp, while correspondingly and overwhelming flooding the media with pro-vaccine marketing. Money does indeed buy power and power protects profits. With virtually all vaccines licensed manufactured by just five companies and revenues exceeding $25 billion annually and growing, the money and power are highly concentrated.

Stepping back though, away from the money and marketing, why anyone with a brain would believe that any vaccine or medication was universally safe and effective defies logic, not to mention the inherent variability of human physiology. To be entirely and ardently pro-vaccine as many are, one has to choose to ignore that basic fact – that for some people, some vaccines and medications either will not work or worse, will cause great injury. To ignore that fact, especially when there are no direct financial incentives to do so, one has to invalidate the tragedies that are in front of them; to convince oneself that the injured person before them is either lying to gain attention or simply is not credible and therefore not to be taken seriously. Either way, the net result of de-legitimizing injury, is to shutter the possibility of additional research, research that might find a connection. It’s quite a deft bit of cognitive dissonance, more so as the evidence of injury mounts.

De-legitimizing a claim of vaccine injury is easy; attack the person, not the claim, label the mom (because it is almost always moms making these claims) as irrational (hysterical), ignorant, and best of all, as anti-science; as if science is infallible and all-knowing rather than dynamic and changing. Ironically, bolstering the certitude of science, especially that which comes from organizations whose fiduciary or political obligations demand results remain in their favor, does more to reduce the credibility of the scientific endeavor and the public trust than simply admitting that sometimes the science is wrong or not nearly as clear as we once had believed. Polarization is more than just annoying and inconvenient. It is dangerous.

Skewed Development and Evaluation Process

As with the drug industry, especially after the recent Supreme Court decisions, the entire infrastructure of the vaccine industry is skewed in favor of finding vaccines safe and effective. There is very little space or motivation to find a vaccine dangerous. According to a recent report on Conflicts of Interest in  Vaccine Safety Research:

Fixing the Vaccine System – The Long Game

There is no easy or quick fix. The systems and barriers to vaccine, and indeed, drug safety are deeply entrenched in organizational and legal frameworks. The pendulum has swung so far away from consumer safety in favor of corporate protections that efforts to fix these problems must be viewed in terms of a long game; one that recognizes institutional and policy change has to take place over the next 10-20 years. The first step, however, is to recognize there is a problem and that vaccine injuries are likely within a system where there is little transparency and even less accountability for injuries.

The second and more difficult phase includes the major policy and infrastructure changes.
Those are a mess. Many are discussed in the piece Conflicts of Interest in  Vaccine Safety Research.  Many more need to be added. I will be writing a piece on this topic over the coming weeks. If you would like to contribute your thoughts on removing conflicts of interest from the vaccine safety and indeed, the entire drug development and review process, send me a note. In the mean time, we’re doing our part to understand Gardasil and Cervarix, vaccine safety and injury.

We Need Your Help

More people than ever are reading Hormones Matter, a testament to the need for independent voices in health and medicine. We are not funded and accept limited advertising. Unlike many health sites, we don’t force you to purchase a subscription. We believe health information should be open to all. If you read Hormones Matter, like it, please help support it. Contribute now.

Yes, I would like to support Hormones Matter. 

Image by HeungSoon from Pixabay

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Gardasil Cervarix Online Study Continues – Participate Now

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Gardasil Cervarix HPV Vaccine Survey

Controversy surrounds the HPV vaccines, Gardasil and Cervarix. Since their release, the vaccine industry, the media and medical societies have touted the safety and success of the vaccines in preventing or reducing HPV viral infections and thus, in preventing cervical cancer. Patient groups, mom’s of vaccine injured girls and anti-vaccine groups on the other hand, argue loudly that the rate and severity of serious adverse events are seriously under-reported by industry and the proof that these vaccines prevent or reduce cervical cancer is lacking. Even one of the lead developers of the vaccine, Diane Harper has come out against it.

Somewhere in the middle is the Vaccine Adverse Event Registry (VAERS), where only 1-10% of a very limited range adverse events are reported. Even with the limited reporting to VAERS, the severity and frequency of adverse events is growing and should not be ignored. Data collected from VAERS indicates a serious adverse event rate 4.3 per 100,000 doses of Gardasil. Serious adverse events are those that cause death or are life threatening, require hospitalization, cause persistent disability or incapacity and/or require medical treatment to prevent permanent impairment or damage. This is compared to a risk of cervical cancer of 7.9 per 100,000 and death from cervical cancer at 2.4 per 100,0000 cases in the US.

Considering the severity of the reported adverse reactions and the noted adverse events reporting rate of less than 10% of all cases, having more credible and complete data about true severity and prevalence of said reactions as well as more detailed data about who is at risk for those adverse events is critical.

As a parent, a researcher and the founder of Hormones MatterTM, I decided to do something about the lack of data in this and other areas of women’s health. As part of the Real Women, Real Data series,  The Gardasil Cervarix HPV Vaccine Survey was launched In May of 2013.  It is a comprehensive, online study of Gardasil and Cervarix side-effects and adverse events. The study will run until a study sample of 1000 is reached. The goal is to provide a more accurate and unbiased look at the rate, range and severity of side-effects and adverse events associated with the HPV vaccines, Gardasil and Cervarix.

Take a survey. Share a survey. Suggest a survey.

We need your help to gather these data.  Please take this survey, if have had either vaccine – whether you experienced any side-effects or not. Understanding who is at risk and who is not, is very important. Share the survey link with your friends, sisters, colleagues and anyone you know who has been given the HPV vaccine. Please post it on your Facebook pages and share on Twitter, Linkedin, Reddit and other social media. Write about and re-post this link on your blogs. Anything you can do to spread the word is appreciated. We will need at least a thousand women to find the connections.

It is up to us to protect our daughters. Understanding this vaccine is one way to do that.

Purpose the Gardasil – Cervarix Survey

Women and their physicians need more data about the side-effects of the HPV vaccines, Gardasil and Cervarix. There is a lack of data about who is at risk for adverse events and whether certain pre-existing conditions increase one’s risk for an adverse event. There is also a lack of data about the long term health effects of these vaccines. The purpose of this survey is to fill that data void; to learn more about the risks for and nature of adverse events associated with each of the HPV vaccines, Gardasil and Cervarix.

Who Should Take the Gardasil Cervarix HPV Vaccine Survey?

Girls or women who have been given either vaccine or the parents or other family members of young girls given the vaccine.

We are not currently collecting data on the adverse reactions for men and boys, but intend to launch a separate survey to tackle that population.

How Long Does the Gardasil Cervarix HPV Vaccine Survey Take?

This is a long survey. We felt it was important to assess the full depth, breadth, onset and severity of adverse reactions in order to give parents and women the data they need to make informed medical decisions. This necessitated a longer than desired survey. We estimate it will take approximately 20-30 minutes to complete the survey.  We hope, given what is at risk, survey respondents will take the time to complete the entire survey.

Is the Survey Anonymous and Secure?

Yes. We do not collect personal identifying information and the survey is hosted with SSL encryption using a verisign certificate Version 3, 128 bit encryption.

How Will the Data be Used?

To inform future research and women’s health decision-making.

Who is Conducting this Research?

Researchers from LucineTM, Hormones MatterTM. For more information on Lucine, click here. For more information about Hormones MatterTM , click here.

What Can I Do To Help?

Our organization is completely unfunded at this juncture and we rely entirely on crowdsourcing and volunteers to conduct the research and produce quality health education materials for the public. Get involved and help us prove that hormones matter and that women’s health data matter. Become an advocate, spread the word about our site, our research and our mission. Join our team. Write for us, partner with us, help us grow. For more information contact us at: info@hormonesmatter.com.

To take the Gardasil Cervarix HPV Vaccine Survey, click here.

To take one of our other Real Women. Real Data.TM surveys, click here.

To sign up for our newsletter and receive weekly updates on the latest research news, click here.

Thank you in advance for your help.

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On the Radio: Chandler Marrs and Leslie Botha Talk Hormones and Health

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Chandler Marrs

Earlier this week, I had the great pleasure of speaking with Leslie Carol Botha on her radio show, Holy Hormones Honey, the Greatest Story Never Told, KRFC FM Fort Collins. We spent an hour discussing everything from pregnancy – postpartum mental health and the state of hormone research to women in clinical trials and vaccine safety.  We even talked politics, just a bit.

Front and center was the need for more research and data in all areas of women’s health and the Hormone’s MatterTM solution, a series of crowdsourced studies under the Real Women, Real DataTM, program. Currently, we have three studies underway with many more planned.

In the end, we decided, that we needed to found the Hormones MatterTM University or HMU. Seems like a good idea to me, what do you think?

I had a blast talking about women’s health and hormones and look forward to doing it again. If you want to know why I do, what I do or just want to learn a little bit more about me and why hormones matter in health, have a listen.

To listen to the interview: Do Hormones Matter in Women’s Health? Leslie Botha Interviews Dr. Chandler Marrs on Holy Hormones the Greatest Story Never Told.

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