Treatment of rectovaginal endometriosis with levonorgestrel-releasing intrauterine system

Objective To investigate the effect of the levonorgestrel-releasing intrauterine system(LNG-IUS) in the treatment of rectovaginal endometriosis.Methods This study was conducted in our hospital from January 2005 to June 2008.Thirty-one cases of rectovaginal endometriosis were treated with LNG-IUS.Twenty-six patients received drug treatment for rectovaginal endometriosis were as the control.The therapeutic effect and safety of the treatment and compliance of the patients were compared and analyzed.Results Compared with control group,The excellent effective rate and effective rate were slightly higher and recurrence rate was lower in LNG-IUS treatment group,but the differences were not significant(P0.05);however,the total effective rate was significantly higher than that in control group(P0.05).Symptoms disappeared in a shorter time in patients with excellent effect in LNG-IUS treatment group than control group(P 0.01).The adverse reaction occurred in 3 cases(9.68%) in LNG-IUS treatment group,while it occurred in 11 cases(38.46%) in control group.Except LNG-IUS falled off in one patient,no patient gave up in LNG-IUS treatment group;however 5 patients in control group failed to complete the treatment because of headache,amenorrhoea and other reasons.Conclusion The LNG-IUS provides effective,safe and better compliance for the treatment of patients with rectovaginal endometriosis.