“Don’t overreact or neglect,” warned Dr Shereen Bhutta while wrapping up a session she co-chaired on ‘Gynaecological problems at extremes of age’ as part of the 22nd Biennial Pakistan Islamic Medical Association (PIMA) convention at the Expo Centre on Sunday. Dr Bhutta runs Jinnah hospital’s department of obstetrics and gynaecology. Her co-chair was Dr Azra Jameel of Qatar Hospital.
Despite an early start on Sunday, the hall was filled with gynaecologists and medical students. Only women were allowed to attend the session. The medical director of the Sindh Institute of Reproductive Medicine, Shaheen Zafar, spoke on menstrual irregularities in adolescence. “If a mother suffers from menstrual problems, it’s likely that her daughter would suffer from it too,” she said. Among the more common disorders emerging in young girls is amenorrhea or the absence of a cycle. Also, half of women get dysmenorrhea, the medical term for pain during the cycle. “Mothers think that extreme pain during the period is beneficial for a smooth cycle. But they are wrong. Extreme pain needs to be treated.”
More teens are developing polycystic ovarian syndrome whose symptoms include irregular cycles, unnatural hair growth, for instance on the face, and weight gain. “If not treated properly, it can lead to infertility,” warned Zafar.
Rafia Baloch from the Sheikh Zayed Hospital for Women in Larkana presented a paper on the use of paracervical block, an anesthetic process used in gynaecology, which she says is cheaper and safe. It can completely relieve the pain of the first stage of labor, is ideal for dilatation and curettage (D&C) in poor risk patients and in patients with an incomplete abortion.
Shabeen Naz of Sobhraj Maternity Hospital spoke on oral hypoglycemic drugs in pregnancy and lactation. Diabetes is on the rise in pregnant women, and certain types of these drugs are safe for them. “These ones are significantly less dangerous to the developing fetus,” she said.
Dow University of Health Sciences’ Ayesha Khan noted that up to 18 per cent of women in Karachi are suffering from premature menopause, which is the end of a woman’s reproductive life. “In our society, menopause starts from 44 years. But today, women are developing it even before they turn 40.”
As life expectancy increases, more women are suffering from menopause, whose consequences include osteoporosis.
Published in The Express Tribune, March 5th, 2012.
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I'm sort of scared of my gynaecologist too. But, that's because she beat me unmercifully after she entered the room and saw that I was a man. By the way, never make a doctor mad, they really know the best spots to make it hurt.
One would expect the literates to know better but I know even educated women who shy away from talking to gynaecologists about their problems. They keep showing third rate doctors who keep giving them colourful syrups without any tests and tell them it is only seasonal fever or flu and will go away on its own. Affordability, let me tell you, is not an issue in this case. Parents in such cases are their own childrens' worst enemies.
I am glad such an important issue is being discussed openly. Pakistani women around the world are making a name for themselves and if we need to follow in their footsteps, we must start from taking our health seriously.
Important topic to shed light upon. I know far too many mothers who are unwilling to take their unmarried daughters to the gyni and I simply don't understand why; it especially shocks me when educated mothers are opposed to it. Married women or sexually active women are NOT the only people who can have health problems people, and taking your daughter to the gyni is NOT something dirty or repulsive. Take these issues seriously lest you be the reason for more serious health problems in your young daughters!
Women's health issues have always been regarded and projected as something 'dirty' and 'impure'.it's good that now the media and doctors are trying to change this sort of medieval mentality.It's time women stopped feeling ashamed of their gender and stopped being ashamed of their bodies.All these tags and labels of impure and unclean are just ways of keeping women down and under the control of men by making them feel ashamed of their gender.