Failure of uterine fibroid embolization

Jack Y J Huang, Huang JY, Kafy S, Souzan Kafy, Alexandre Dugas, Dugas A, David Valenti, Valenti D, Togas Tulandi, Tulandi T
Fertility and sterility · 2006 · vol. 85(1) , pp. 30–35 · doi:10.1016/j.fertnstert.2005.03.091 · PMID:16412722 · W2040965737
article OA: closed CC0 ⤵ 2 in-corpus citations
View on OpenAlex View on PubMed View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by gemini-2.5-flash-lite, 2026-06-07 ⓘ

This paper details cases where uterine fibroid embolization did not achieve the desired outcome for patients.

One-sentence paraphrase of the abstract; not a substitute for reading it. No clinical advice. How this works

Abstract

ObjectiveTo assess the outcomes of patients who underwent uterine fibroid embolization (UFE) and to evaluate factors associated with failure of UFE.DesignRetrospective study.SettingUniversity teaching hospital.Patient(s)Two hundred thirty-three consecutive patients who underwent UFE from November 1997 to February 2004.Intervention(s)Uterine fibroid embolizations were performed by three interventional radiologists using 355-500-mu polyvinyl alcohol particles.Main outcome measure(s)Hysterectomy rate, myomectomy rate, and repeat UFE rate.Result(s)With a mean follow-up of 13 months, a total of 22 patients underwent surgery after UFE (9.4%); 16 had hysterectomies (6.9%), and 6 had myomectomies (2.6%). This included 3 patients who underwent repeat UFE and subsequently required surgical intervention. The mean (+/- SEM) time interval between UFE and subsequent treatment was 12.5 +/- 2.0 months. Among patients who required surgery, 13 (59.1%) presented with recurrent menorrhagia, and 5 (22.7%) complained of persistent abdominal pain. Histopathologic examination revealed concomitant findings of adenomyosis in 25% of hysterectomy specimens. Patients who failed UFE were more likely to have had a previous myomectomy (13% vs. 2.4%) and significant reduction in the uterine size 6 months after UFE (57.1% vs. 25.2%).Conclusion(s)The overall failure rate of UFE is 9.4%. Failure is mainly due to persistent menorrhagia and abdominal pain. Shrinkage of the uterus after UFE does not necessarily correlate with long-term success of UFE.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

MeSH descriptors

Embolization, Therapeutic Embolization, Therapeutic Leiomyoma Uterine Neoplasms Adult Female Follow-Up Studies Humans Hysterectomy Hysterectomy Leiomyoma Leiomyoma Leiomyoma Menorrhagia Myometrium Myometrium Myometrium Polyvinyl Alcohol Postoperative Complications Reoperation

Citation neighborhood

Papers in the corpus that this work cites (lower rings, blue) and that cite this one (upper rings, green). Dot size scales with the paper's in-corpus citation count — bigger dot = more influential within the endo/adeno field. Click a dot to open that paper. [ expand to 2 hops ] — adds papers reached through this work's immediate citers/citees. Heavier; up to 60 extra dots.

References (36)

Cited by (2)

Source provenance

europepmc
last seen: 2026-08-18T06:10:16.649438+00:00
openalex
last seen: 2026-06-04T00:00:01.174412+00:00
pubmed
last seen: 2026-05-13T22:15:23.967219+00:00
unpaywall
last seen: 2026-08-18T06:27:49.008893+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK