Better research into blood loss

According to Lena van Doorn in her doctoral thesis, in 20 percent of women who have abnormal blood loss following menopause, gynecologists do tests that are unnecessary or too extensive and that do not detect any additional malignancies.

To limit the number of unnecessary tests, she proposes combining patient characteristics with ultrasound, a combination that results in fewer distressing tests. Not all patients benefit from the standard tests – measuring the thickness of the endometrium – to the same degree. Thickening of the endometrium is more common in women with diabetes and/or who are overweight than in those who do not suffer from these conditions. This is why women in these groups also have to have tissue examined relatively more often than other women.

Lena van Doorn received her PhD from Utrecht University on December 13.The name of her thesis is, “Studies on the diagnosis of endometrial cancer in women with postmenopausal bleeding.”