Endometriosis: pathogenesis and treatment

Paolo Vercellini; Paola Viganò; Edgardo Somigliana; Luigi Fedele

doi:10.1038/nrendo.2013.255

Endometriosis: pathogenesis and treatment

Paolo Vercellini, Paola Viganò, Edgardo Somigliana, Luigi Fedele

Nature reviews. Endocrinology · 2013 · vol. 10(5) , pp. 261–275 · doi:10.1038/nrendo.2013.255 · PMID:24366116 · W2012650501

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⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06+body, 2026-06-07 ⓘ

This paper reviews endometriosis pathogenesis, noting its prevalence, potential causes like retrograde menstruation combined with genetic and environmental factors, and current treatment limitations for pain, infertility, and lesion recurrence.

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

⚙ AI-generated deep summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-07 ⓘ

This paper reviews the pathogenesis and treatment of endometriosis, describing how ectopic endometrial tissue is thought to arise (with retrograde menstruation emphasized) and how menstrual factors interact with genetic and environmental influences to shape disease phenotype. It summarizes current approaches to diagnosis (direct visualization and histology) and management, noting that hormonal therapies can suppress pain by inhibiting ovulation/menstruation but typically do not eradicate lesions, while surgery may relieve pain with high recurrence; it further reports that infertility outcomes improve only modestly with lesion elimination and that in vitro fertilization is an alternative. The key caveat is that proposed pathogenic theories do not explain all endometriosis types, and overall treatment benefits (especially for fertility and lesion eradication) are limited. This paper is centrally about endometriosis — it provides an overview of mechanisms underlying endometriosis and discusses pain, infertility, recurrence, and cancer risk in that context.

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Condition tags

endometriosis

MeSH descriptors

Endometriosis Endometriosis Endometriosis Endometriosis Endometriosis Endometriosis Endometriosis Female Humans Infertility, Female Infertility, Female Infertility, Female Ovarian Neoplasms Ovarian Neoplasms Pain Pain Pain Management Secondary Prevention

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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 (100)

Cited by (50)

Source provenance

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