Navigating the therapeutic itinerary: Access to healthcare services and medications for endometriosis

Carolina de Souza Peruzzo, Gustavo Magno Baldin Tiguman, Patrícia Melo Aguiar
In: Journal of Endometriosis and Pelvic Pain Disorders · 2025 · vol. 17(4) , pp. 169–177 · doi:10.1177/22840265251340363 · W4410452878
article OA: closed CC0
Full text JSON View on OpenAlex View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-08 ⓘ

This study investigated healthcare and medication access for endometriosis patients in Brazil, finding diagnostic delays and barriers to specialists, with direct purchase of medications being common and associated with socioeconomic factors.

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

Abstract

Background: Endometriosis is a chronic condition causing pain and fertility issues. This study aimed to evaluate access to health services and medication among patients with endometriosis in Brazil. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted from March to June 2022, collecting data on clinical diagnosis, access to health services, medications used, and potential barriers to access. Exploratory descriptive analysis was conducted and associated factors were identified through multivariate logistic regression. Results: Eight hundred eighty-five valid responses were obtained. 29.6% of patients took 1–5 years for diagnosis, with private services being the most used for diagnosis (57.6%) and follow-up (52.8%). 90.1% had difficulty finding specialists. Main medication access was through direct purchase (91.2%). People with health insurance were more likely to have full access to medicines than people without (OR = 1.94; 95%CI 1.36–2.77). Older people were less likely to have full access (45–59 years: OR = 0.39 (95%CI 0.19–0.81)) than young adults aged 18–24. Black people were less likely to have full access than white people (OR = 0.61 (95%CI 0.37–0.99)). People with higher incomes were more likely to have full access than poorer people (2–4 minimum wages: OR = 2.10 (95%CI 1.41–3.12)). The most used drugs were sex hormones and modulators of the genital system (90.5%), especially hormonal contraceptives for systemic use. Off-label use of antidepressants and antiepileptics was commonly observed for the treatment of endometriosis. Conclusion: The study revealed that patients with endometriosis face significant challenges in accessing treatment in Brazil, particularly due to the limited therapeutic options and off-label use of medications.
Full text 1,430 characters · extracted from oa-doi-fallback · 5 sections · click to expand

Abstract

Background:

Methods

Results:

Conclusion

Get full access to this article View all access and purchase options for this article. Data availability statement

References

Cite Cite Cite Download to reference manager If you have citation software installed, you can download citation data to the citation manager of your choice Information, rights and permissions Information Published In

Keywords

Data availability statement Article versions Authors Metrics and citations Metrics Journals metrics This article was published in Journal of Endometriosis and Pelvic Pain Disorders. View All Journal MetricsPublication usage* Total views and downloads: 158 *Publication usage tracking started in December 2016 Publications citing this one Receive email alerts when this publication is cited Web of Science: 0 view articles Opens in new tab Crossref: There are no citing articles to show. Figures and tables Figures & Media Tables View Options Access options If you have access to journal content via a personal subscription, university, library, employer or society, select from the options below: loading institutional access options Alternatively, view purchase options below: Purchase 24 hour online access to view and download content. Access journal content via a DeepDyve subscription or find out more about this option.

Text is read by the "Ask this paper" AI Q&A widget below. Extraction quality varies by source — PMC NXML preserves structure cleanly, OA-HTML may include some navigation residue, and OA-PDF can have broken hyphenation. The publisher copy (via DOI) is the canonical version.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

⚙ Ask this paper AI returns verbatim quotes from the full text · source: oa-doi-fallback ⓘ

Answers must be backed by verbatim quotes from this paper's full text. Hallucinated quotes are dropped automatically; if no verbatim passage answers the question, we say so. How this works

Condition tags

endometriosis

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 (33)

Source provenance

openalex
last seen: 2026-06-10T17:14:06.276822+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK