PELVIC IRRADIATION IN THE CHILD-BEARING WOMAN

Irradiation therapy has encroached on the field of surgery to an ever increasing degree and is destined to make still greater inroads as the result of improved technic. It is fair to assume that there can be no epoch-making advances in the field of pelvic surgery. It remains to be seen how far pelvic lesions can be controlled and eradicated by means other than surgery. At the present time interest largely centers in the x-rays and radium as substitutes for surgery in the treatment of certain pelvic disorders. Gynecologists and radiologists are not wholly in accord on the management of pelvic lesions found after the child-bearing period, but the problem becomes enormously complicated in the earlier years of sex life. To control hemorrhage, to relieve intolerable pain of menstruation, to check the growth of fibroid tumors and to alleviate their symptoms without producing permanent amenorrhea and sterility are indeed vexing