Economic evaluation of three surgical interventions for menorrhagia

H. Fernandez
In: Human Reproduction · 2003 · vol. 18(3) , pp. 583–587 · doi:10.1093/humrep/deg141 · PMID:12615829 · W2132489601
article OA: bronze CC0 ⤵ 4 in-corpus citations
📄 Open PDF View on OpenAlex View on PubMed View at publisher
⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-09 ⓘ

This study compared the effectiveness and costs of vaginal hysterectomy, endometrial ablation, and thermo-coagulation for menorrhagia, finding hysterectomy had the lowest failure rate but highest cost, while ablation and thermo-coagulation were comparable.

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

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The study was carried out to compare the overall effectiveness and direct economic costs of vaginal hysterectomy (VH), endometrial ablation (EA) and thermo-coagulation (TC) for the treatment menorrhagia. METHODS: We treated 50, 50 and 47 women with menorrhagia (>150 points on the Higham pictorial chart) by VH, EA and TC respectively. The patients were treated consecutively by the same surgeon and the choice between the three procedures depended on the desire of the patients. Resource utilization for the interventions was collected retrospectively from the hospital charts. A study questionnaire was mailed to the patients 24-36 months after the primary surgery. Patients who reported that they had undergone a second procedure or who were still menorrhagic were considered as treatment failures. RESULTS: As expected, the failure rate was lowest for VH. The total cost (without re-intervention for persistent menorrhagia) was 5315 Euros for VH, 1098 Euros for EA and 921 Euros for TC. The total cost with re-intervention was calculated based on therapeutic strategies used in 2001 and estimated at 5321 Euros for VH, 1263 Euros for EA and 1320 Euros for TC. CONCLUSIONS: The two out-patient procedures are very comparable in terms of success rates and costs. Choices will depend on budgeting considerations, surgeon skill and patient preference. The results may give guidance to investment decisions.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

Citation neighborhood (sparse)

Too few in-corpus citations on either side for a chart; here are the lists.

Cites (3)

Cited by (4)

References (9)

Cited by (4)

Source provenance

openalex
last seen: 2026-05-11T05:49:40.447239+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK