Prevalence of occult microscopic endometriosis in clinically negative peritoneum during laparoscopy for chronic pelvic pain

Ashley Gubbels, Rui Li, Donna Kreher, Donna A. Kreher, N. Mehandru, Natasha Mehandru, Mario Castellanos, Mario E. Castellanos, Nita A Desai, Nita Desai, Michael Hibner
International Journal of Gynecology & Obstetrics · 2020 · vol. 151(2) , pp. 260–266 · doi:10.1002/ijgo.13303 · PMID:32644227 · W3041742625
article OA: closed CC0 ⤵ 22 in-corpus citations
View on OpenAlex View on PubMed View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-07 ⓘ

Among patients with chronic pelvic pain and a clinically negative peritoneum during laparoscopy, 39% had occult microscopic endometriosis detected via biopsy.

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

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To determine the prevalence of occult microscopic endometriosis in patients with chronic pelvic pain and negative laparoscopy. METHODS: A retrospective cross-sectional study included women who underwent laparoscopic evaluation for chronic pelvic pain by three fellowship-trained gynecologic surgeons at a community hospital from January 2011 to December 2016. The aim was to evaluate the prevalence of microscopic endometriosis in this population. RESULTS: In 142 patients with clinically negative peritoneum on laparoscopy, 39% had occult microscopic endometriosis. Cramping pain score during menses was found to be lower in the positive biopsy group (6.9 vs 8.0, P=0.046). No differences were appreciated in age of menarche, pain during various parts of the menstrual cycle, or duration of symptoms. The biopsy-positive group had a younger age at time of evaluation, although not statistically significant (P=0.179). Current use of hormones affected neither biopsy results nor menstrual or pain characteristics. Detection was similar between robotic and laparoscopic cases and operative morbidity was minimal. CONCLUSION: Occult microscopic endometriosis may be present in approximately 39% of patients with clinically negative appearing peritoneum undergoing laparoscopy for chronic pelvic pain. Given this, biopsies should be performed in patients undergoing laparoscopy who do not have visible lesions.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

Condition tags

endometriosischronic_pelvic_pain

MeSH descriptors

Endometriosis Peritoneum Adult Arizona Arizona Chronic Pain Chronic Pain Cross-Sectional Studies Endometriosis Endometriosis Female Humans Laparoscopy Pain Measurement Pelvic Pain Pelvic Pain Peritoneum Prevalence Retrospective Studies Young Adult

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 (11)

Cited by (22)

Source provenance

europepmc
last seen: 2026-06-14T06:08:20.186862+00:00
openalex
last seen: 2026-06-10T17:14:06.276822+00:00
pubmed
last seen: 2026-05-13T22:21:53.586419+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK