The pelvic pain syndrome

James Drife, J O Drife
British journal of obstetrics and gynaecology · 1993 · vol. 100(6) , pp. 508–510 · doi:10.1111/j.1471-0528.1993.tb15297.x · PMID:8334082 · W2063020887
article OA: closed CC0 ⤵ 6 in-corpus citations
View on OpenAlex View on PubMed View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-08 ⓘ

This paper discusses the understanding of pelvic pain syndrome, its diagnosis through venography and laparoscopy, and management strategies including psychological support, hormonal therapy, and surgical intervention.

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

Abstract

Physicians are beginning more and more to understand pelvic pain syndrome (PPS). Transuterine pelvic venography shows that some women who suffer from chronic pelvic pain have moderate or severe congestion. On the other hand, laparoscopy indicates that some cases have no physical abnormalities. A psychological component is frequently involved, but automatically referring a woman with PPS to a psychiatrist is unproductive. Instead, physicians should involve a psychologist based at a gynecologic clinic, especially in the case of women with a history of sex abuse with a high somatization score. In the case of women who suffer from PPS but clearly show no apparent physical causes, physicians should not investigate any further, but instead reassure them. Reassurance usually results in alleviation of pain within 6 months. PPS only strikes premenopausal women, suggesting that ovarian activity may also be involved. Thus, treating women with hormones to suppress ovulation benefits some women. The medical community still does not know whether longterm treatment with gonadotropin-releasing hormone analogues and hormone replacement effectively eliminates pelvic pain. If the above treatments do not successfully treat PPS, physicians can perform a hysterectomy and bilateral oophorectomy and prescribe sufficient hormone replacement therapy to remove heretofore undetected disease (e.g., ovarian cysts, adenomyosis, and fibroids) in 33% of cases of idiopathic PPS and alleviate pelvic pain in 66% of such cases.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

Condition tags

adenomyosischronic_pelvic_pain

MeSH descriptors

Pain Pelvis Chronic Disease Female Humans Pain Pain Pain Management Pelvis

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 (41)

Cited by (6)

Source provenance

openalex
last seen: 2026-06-10T17:14:06.276822+00:00
pubmed
last seen: 2026-05-13T22:11:39.448046+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK