Doctors in China solved the years-old mystery of why one 26-year-old patient was experiencing abdominal pain when they found her IUD in her bladder.
The patient got the IUD inserted in 2011, but got pregnant months later and gave birth February 2012.
But when her child was born via a c-section doctors found no trace of the IUD and assumed it had become embedded into her uterus.
However, an x-ray of the woman’s pelvis finally explained why she had become pregnant despite having taken the preventative measure: the IUD had perforated her uterus and traveled to her bladder, which was causing urinary tract complications.
Doctors found the six-year-old IUD of a 26-year-old woman in her bladder. The red arrow points to that one, while the white arrow points to a subsequent IUD she had had inserted after the first one proved ineffective
The woman’s case has been published in the journal Medicine, which states that uterine perforation is among the most hazardous complications that can come with an IUD.
The report states that this happens to one in every 1,000 women who receive an IUD.
But because the condition does not always cause symptoms, this number might be far higher, the report’s authors warn.
A number of factors can affect whether or not an IUD punctures a woman’s uterus, including the type of device she has inserted, when she has it inserted and the way her doctor does the insertion procedure.
But after it pushes through the organ, it can roam to areas of the body far from where it was intended to stay. ‘Once an IUD perforates the uterus, it can move freely into many places, not only in the pelvic cavity, but also in the abdominal cavity,’ the report says.
This can result in chronic pelvic and abdominal inflammation, other organs being perforated and intestines being obstructed.
The woman whose case is featured in the new report experienced pain in her abdomen and waist, the sensation of having to pee urgently and frequently and blood in her urine.
‘These symptoms were absolutely caused by the migrated MCu IUD, but the specific reason is still unclear,’ the report said.
The report also said doctors should followup with patients after their IUDs have been inserted to make sure they have remained in place. While some IUDs that drift out of place will not harm the body, it is best to remove them, the report stated.
‘Although some perforated IUDs do not cause clinical symptoms, it is better to properly remove them to avoid the damage of other organs,’ the analysis said.
The report also said that IUDs should be removed from menopausal women immediately and that the type of device a woman should get depends on her uterus.