Histeroscopy before a laparoscopy...?

[KGme]

Hi all,

Just wondering - I have symptoms of endometriosis and the consultant has booked a histeroscopy for me. I was expecting a laparoscopy. When I questioned it he said I’d need a histeroscopy before a laparoscopy. Has this been the case for anyone else...?

[luthien]

A hysteroscopy can be carried out at the same time as a laparoscopy; I had that for mine. Actually mine was just a lap and then before the op my specialist said "lets just add in the hysteroscopy to be sure and cover everything" which I was fine with.

The hysteroscopy looks at the vagina, cervix and uterus for any abnormalities, usually it's done under local anaesthetic but in cases where it's known that there could be tightness / pain / discomfort it can be done under general anaesthetic. The laparoscopy looks at everything in the abdomen including the outside of the bowels, bladder and uterus etc.

Probably a good idea to ask why your specialist has said to have the hysteroscopy first? If you're not good at stuff up your vagina - as in you have pain / cramps and sometimes spotting you can push for having that done under general at the same time as the lap as it'll be less stressful for you - mention that too.

Hope that helps xx

[C2691]

I had mine together both under general. Surely you can request this as I don’t think it would need to be done as 2 different appointments 🤷🏻‍♀️I’d rather be asleep if the option was there!! 😆

[C2691]

Oh sorry maybe your dr wants to do hysteroscopy to decide whether he needs to do lap... mine wanted to do both from the start. Sorry I did t read your post correctly!

[lemon_mint]

Hey KGme - the best way is to speak to the gyne department/consultant that has referred you as to why they felt hysteroscopy is more appropriate. Have you had any ultrasounds? any MRI scans? I have just had a combined hysteroscopy and laparoscopy but the former was due to them finding an endometrial polyp on the scans (no endometriosis was seen on my MRI - I decided to do one without contrast as I was too worried about side effects so that's probably why so could have been a bit of a waste of money [?]). Because I saw a very experienced surgeon who ordered these tests and also felt a lesion through my vaginal wall and suspected endometriosis he said the best course of action is to have both procedures at the same time and treat anything they find along the way (i.e. have the polyp removed during hysteroscopy - which was confirmed on ultrasound and MRI and then do a diagostic laparoscopy with treatment of endometriosis if necessary). Turned out he was right and they did find a "large deposit of endometriosis" attached to my bowel and had it removed. I went private because I gave up on the NHS waiting times (been on the list for hysteroscopy since August 2019 and only finally got appointment for March 2020 but then my symptoms developed way further in December 2019 - January 2020. My GP kept treating me for for a "urinary tract infection" which made no sense after a course of antibiotics did not do much and continuous worsening abdominal pain along side constant bleeding. My suggestion is to push for more information and explanations and if you have not had any scans done do those first so that they could potentially order another procedure - but if you are on the hysteroscopy list already it may mean they either need to have a second procedure ordered at a later stage or move your procedure to do both potentially [?]