#loop electrosurgical excisional procedure

[rapeculturerealities]

In the 1950s, cervical cancer was a leading cause of cancer deaths for American women (it still kills more than 260,000 people a year in developing countries). Now, it’s almost completely preventable, says Linda Nicoll, MD, a gyno at NYU Langone Health.

This is largely because of better screening techniques and the HPV vaccine, which protects against the riskiest strains of the STI that causes most cervical cancers. But treatments like LEEP also played a role. The procedure, first performed in the U.S. in 1990, is like a second line of defense, excising cells that may otherwise lead to cancer. It’s fast—a doctor slices into the cervix and scoops out sketchy tissue, the same way you might cut a bruise out of an apple. And it usually works.

It’s also super common. Up to one million women in the U.S. are diagnosed every year with abnormal cervical cells, or what MDs call cervical dysplasia. Not all cases are high risk, but if doctors feel the precancerous spots need to be removed, LEEP is the most popular treatment. Because it’s so simple, it flies under the radar: No one knows exactly how many are done each year, since they’re considered as minor as, say, having a skin tag cut off, says Noah Goldman, MD, a gynecologic oncologist at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School. (“You’d never know how many people have skin tags removed,” he explains, “because most doctors just say, ‘Oh, I’ll numb it up and take it off for you.’”)

There are other ways to get rid of suspicious cervical cells, including freezing them off with cryotherapy and using a scalpel to cut them out. But doctors love LEEP because it’s so easy to perform. It’s also considered safe, with seemingly straightforward side effects like bleeding and discharge and an increased risk of pregnancy complications.

Except that Sasha—and hundreds of others—insist that it carries a devastating risk their doctors never mentioned. In a Facebook group called Healing From LEEP/LLETZ (LLETZ is the term used overseas), women share how LEEPs radically altered their sex lives, how penetrative sex is now painful, how they’ve lost sensation in their vaginas, how they could now go the rest of their lives without sex. “I haven’t reached orgasm since the operation,” wrote one woman. “I miss my old self, who burned with lust during sex.”

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[yuppersreppuy]

Read the Cosmopolitan article, "This Routine Gyno Procedure Could Mean You Never Orgasm Again."

It was about LEEP, or loop electrosurgical excisional procedure, which is used to remove precancerous cervical cells by cutting and burning them off, basically, and there have been women who have reported loss of sensation following that procedure. The article recommended opting for cryotherapy (freezing) instead.

There's also the Cosmopolitan article, "These Cancer Patients Wanted to Get Rid of Their Breasts for Good. Their Doctors Had Other Ideas." There are surgeons who push reconstruction upon their patients, ones who go ahead and do skin-sparing mastectomies (leaving flaps of skin for implants), ones who lack the skill to get good results for going flat...

[rhyannontyballa]

Women who are tested with 'abnormal cervical cells' from a pap smear, often are scheduled for further testing. A lot of these abnormal cervical cells can be attributed to normal, harmless things such as: puberty, hormone imbalance, menopause, pregnancy, tampon use and even sexual intercourse. Abnormal PAP test results can also be due to vaginal use of medical preparations, HPV (Human Pappiloma Virus), the use of feminine hygiene products like douches or fragrances. less harmful diseases other than cancer, inflammation or infection from yeast infections, herpes and trichomonas and even the pap smear in itself can cause inflammation and thus can trigger an abnormal test result. This means that pap smears often produce 'false positives', meaning that whenever 'abnormal' cells (also called 'pre-cancerous' cells) are detected, your test result is positive, but that doesn't mean you have cancer or will develop cancer (contrary to what many women believe). Even in the case of an HPV infection, which is said to be the cause of cervical cancer, yet never proven to be the cause(!), it is estimated that 90% of the cases clear up on their own. Only certain strains of HPV that remain in the body for longer time may mean cancer is present(most cervical cancers are slow growing cancers), which in turn means, the immune system is weakened otherwise it would have tackled that HPV strain already.   It is known that STRESS weakens the immune system (there's also the theory that cancer is a reaction to stress) and many women experience stress before, during and after a pap smear. Before the pap smear, women often anticipate stress and anxiety (that she may remember from a previous gyn visit) for the invasive pelvic exam and afterwards she often feels stressed out because of waiting for the test results, but especially when she hears the verdict of having a positive test result. There are also women who develop PTSD from a traumatic pap smear experience. All of this stress is unnecessary and dangerous, because she may be stressing needlessly over a false positive(meaning there is no cancer threat) and in the meanwhile her stress levels are weakening her immune system which makes her more susceptible for contracting disease- the very thing she is ironically trying to prevent by undergoing a pap smear. Another reason why this costly and often stress-evoking test is questionable, is because it is done for a disease that is actually very rare, since it affects only slightly more than one half of one percent of women! But this is not everything, as it is also a dangerous practice. The smears with positive test results, from which many are false positives, lead to more painful and invasive follow-up tests such as excisional biopsies as part of further diagnosis of 'abnormal' cervical cells and/or as part of immediate treatment during a colposcopy through either one or a combination of the following methods: cold knife cone biopsy* (excision of a cone-shaped piece from the cervix with a scalpel/knife), LLETZ: (Large Loop Excision of the Transformation Zone. involves the excision of about 1½ sugar lumps of tissue from the cervix using a fine wire loop and diathermy current.) , LASER cone biopsy (a cone of tissue is excised using a LASER with carbon dioxide), LASER ablation (a similar amount of tissue is ablated using LASER)   LASER diathermy( (a similar amount of tissue is ablated using diathermy) electrocoagulation (LEEP: Loop Electrosurgical Excision Procedure uses a wire loop heated by electric current cut off the bottom portion of the cervix ((100 degrees heat applied to cervix)) Needle excision of the transformation zone (NETZ)(– a cone of tissue is excised using a needle diathermy), or cryocautery (freezing the cervix with liquid nitrogen) which makes PAP smear screening in asymptomatic women especially those in the age group and any other circumstances that cause a high rate of false positives, not only unnecessary, but dangerous as well. Why? Because these procedures damage the cervix, which in turn can have very harmful consequences such as: cervical stenosis**(damage and narrowing of the passageway through the cervix) which can lead to : endometriosis, infertility, hematometra (an accumulation of blood in the uterus), pyometra (pus accumulated in the uterus) (a hematometra or pyometra can cause pain or cause the uterus to bulge), menstrual dysfunction such as no periods (amenorrhea), painful periods (dysmenorrhea), and abnormal bleeding, haemorrhage from the cervix, which may need blood transfusion or further surgery, infections, may be introduced into the uterus or tubes or abdomen..   Nerve damage Also 'cervical incompetence' (and may require surgery (cerclage: stitching of the cervix) when the cervix is scarred shut)- which can cause : difficulties during labour miscarriages, high risk pregnancy, premature babies*** and c-sections plus psychological issues , as well as loss of sexual sensitivity Read more:  http://womenagainststirrups.proboards.com/thread/70/harmful-consequences-pap-smears#ixzz5HYujjXox