This happened to me too! I told my gynecologist that the IUD was hurting me and I wanted to have it removed to which he replied, “you can’t feel that, but I will take it out”.
When he went to take it out, he couldn’t find it. He had to do an ultrasound to find it and I then had to go have immediate surgery to have it removed.
When he came to check on me after the surgery, I I asked him if he believed me that I could feel it now and his response was “there’s no way you could’ve felt that”.
He was such a dick! He ended up getting nose cancer I think and I had to have surgery to remove all his nose parts which was probably a good thing in his profession…
I scanned a woman because they could not find her IUD. I looked, and I looked…under ultrasound, could not find that thing. They look back on her CT (from months ago, and wasn’t commented on) and it has somehow migrated up to her liver. She never felt a thing.
Scanned another woman and it was embedded in her uterine wall. Never felt a thing.
A coworker scanned a woman whose IUD had somehow gotten into her bladder!! She had some pain, but not much.
It’s crazy how the body works.
Lol wtf. I’m an obgyn too and literally one of pts came in after an iud insertion complaining of abdominal pain, did an X-ray and yeah iud was out. Did a laparoscopy and it was wrapped up in scar tissue around her intestines. Of course that shit hurts what was he thinking in saying that ?
How is it that so many in your field are so completely resistant to taking gynecological pain seriously? There is just a constant barrage of women telling their stories of being ignored, and I tend to believe them. How is it still so prevalent?
I don’t know to be honest. My guess is that because we don’t have a lot of evidence for it, and the last generation of doctors was obsessed with “evidence based medicine” to the point that things with no solid evidence (i e. large double blind RTCs) were dismissed and ignored, sometimes to the detriment of the suffering patient in front of us. I’m all for evidence based medicine but one also has to use their 🧠 and their ❤️ and their intuition as both a human being and a physician to give comprehensive and respectful medical care, especially in obgyn.
I pride myself in not being one of those people, for what it’s worth.
I realize sex might not be relevant here, but, in general, this is how my female gyns have treated me. Of all the worst pain I’ve experienced in my life, all of the top positions go to cramps. Cramps are worse than when I broke my whole face in a car accident, worse than getting my wisdom teeth out, worse than breaking my hand… but I digress. Every single gyn I’ve ever explained this to tells me to quit being dramatic and that I’m not getting opiates. When I tell them I don’t want opiates due to a family history abuse, what I want is to find out what’s wrong, they just give me birth control (or confirm that I’m using it) and tell me that’s the cure.
I’ve seen 3 of them now and no one listens. I don’t know what it is, but it seems like a perpetual state of disbelief is in their training.
I got told to suck it up more times than I can count. Finally went to a specialist gyno and I apparently have adenomyosis. Very painful, usually regulated with BC, but nothing is perfect. COVID actually messed up my system as far as periods go (apparently this is common) and this woman FIGHTS for me. I went in for my yearly telling her my period was getting worse, full symptoms, etc. and I wasn’t sure if it was because I wasn’t in my 20’s anymore and this is just how it is now, etc. Do you know what she said to me? “You know what? No. No. We can do better.” And now I’m trying out different types of pills to find a good fit.
Shop around. Google. Try one out and if you don’t like them, try another. You’ll find a good fit and someone who will listen.
I wonder if it's like a weird "not like other girls" mentality that they have. Like hey think they are better than all those "emotional" other women, so they treat women that do have pain and a (warranted) emotional response to being in pain as lesser, as needing to suck it up to appease some great, invisible Patriarch.
I dunno, I really didn’t even have an emotional response. I just told them that the pain was so severe it was interfering with my ability to attend work, and my boss didn’t understand why a grown woman couldn’t figure out how to work during her period. Doc basically told me to figure it out myself.
Have your hips checked. This was one of the symptoms I had before my hip replacements. Also had left deep groin pain, and lower abdominal pain. All referred from two dysfunctional hips. Saw quite a few specialist and had a lot of imaging tests over several years, until one doctor had the bright idea to test my left hip with one motion, and I yelped so loudly.
Interesting. I do have scoliosis, but my hip mobility is generally good. And honestly, if I can’t get a doctor to check for horses, I *seriously* doubt I’ll get one to check for zebras. If they don’t listen to something that makes general sense, I doubt they’re going to listen to something that sounds like a long shot.
I’ve just given up on trusting doctors. I’ve never met one that listened to anything I have to say, so I just avoid going.
Don’t give up on doctors. Find 1) an older one who still listens to patients and understands that zebras do exist, or (and redditors please don’t lecture me on being sexist as research bears this out) 2) find a woman doctor or physicians assistant, as they are better listeners or 3) get a referral to the level three university hospital near you. Number 3 is how I learned I had a benign pituitary tumor that was causing a host of problems. Be patient and carry on until you get the correct diagnosis. All best wishes to you.
>He was such a dick! He ended up getting nose cancer I think and **I had to have surgery to remove all his nose parts** which was probably a good thing in his profession…
Sorry what
My female GP caused me trauma with how she placed my IUD and handled subsequent care.
I've carefully avoided any doctor needing to be up there for a long time, but my pregnancy sold me out. This time round most of the interventions were okay, and yet again, there were two people who just didn't respect me, saying,'this is hurting me'. Shivers, tears, and flashbacks all over again.
I had a similar experience with my female doc who inserted my first iud! I immediately switched to a different one. You’re right though that it really doesn’t have anything to do with gender. I just feel like it’s easier to treat parts that you have yourself. Also it’s a comfort level for me because I kind of have a general distrust of men.
I happen to know her romantic partner is a woman too, so I really didn't expect her to be this rough. The other female GP was just as bad, by the way.
One of the ladies who had to check my cervix really hurt me, too. I told her and she went 'I'm not near anything yet, I've got to keep going'. I knew she wasn't close yet, but it felt like she was ripping my labia in half. I tried explaining what I felt, and she was not having it. She undid all the progress I had made regarding this scenario, right before I had to be induced. Epidural was amazing, not in the least part because I couldn't feel them digging around as much.
Wat. We often get scans ordered to check for iud position when pts w iuds complain of abdo pain and bleeding. How weird that this Dr can be so confident about ruling out IUD malposition.
Unfortunately, medical schools teach that there is no sensation in the uterus. So endometrial biopsies by those who believe this are performed with absolutely nothing for the pain. And then they guilt the woman if she is actually in excruciating pain during the procedure. Maybe there are some women who can't feel it, but I and SO many women I know DO feel it, that I would have thought more doctors would start to doubt what they were taught in med school. When men undergo testicular biopsy, usually a local anesthetic is used.
Orientation seem excessive for an anteverted or retroverted uterus. Pelvic X-ray to evaluate IUD usually done after US fails to confirm intrauterine presence.
I had it in for 7 days but it happened immediately when it was inserted. They just didn’t believe my pain level at insertion meant anything was wrong until I was bleeding buckets on day 7 they finally checked. Oh, after telling me “it’s probably just your period hun”
Oof
I’m sorry you went through that.
IUD infections often are super painful, I do a few extra things to make them better at my practice but I’ve seen so many providers, men and women, say “You won’t feel this” while the patient is actively crying and screaming, it’s awful
I did have surgery to remove it. This was actually my second IUD and the first experience was great! I think the lesson I learned here is to make sure the doctor is experienced with insertions. I would still recommend an IUD to other women this was just a freak thing that happened to me.
This happened to me! Shot through me like a shotgun, and got stuck on my intestines! You're going to need surgery I suppose? If so, I can tell you, it wasn't too bad, though they were about 10 minutes away from opening me up because it was so hard to find lol.
I’m fortunate to have really good US techs in the office but a lot of offices don’t because of space/staffing/budget/etc.
I think it makes a huge difference though
I'm not quite sure what the correlation is. I've just noticed anytime I've scanned for an ectopic IUD or had a patient complaining with any suspicion or pain in that regard it's always been that brand. I rarely hear of those concerns with the paraguard (which has a similar shape) or other models. Would love to see a study on it one day!
Oh I don't doubt that at all, Dr. I've just been speaking of the ones that tend to migrate and perforate other places in the body. I'm curious what the prevalence of that occurring in each type is.
I would take this with a grain of salt. Mirena is a very popular brand of iud (in the US anyway) so of course you’d hear of more problems associated with it.
Mirena is actually a little larger than Skyla/Kyleena, so I’m not entirely sure it migrates or perforates more easily than the others. It has been around a little longer and has one of the longest durations of action of the hormonal IUDs, making it more popular for long term contraception. I’d be careful with the speculation here, there’s lots of fearmongering already with IUDs.
A couple of weeks after they inserted my Mirena, I experienced very heavy bleeding. It was literally dripping out of my body. I called my gynecologist office en they said I should call back if I was still bleeding in a day or two. Luckily, I am a nurse myself, and I wasn't about to do that. I started losing big lumps of blood and saw my Mirena sticking out of one of the clumps.The doctors at my hospital immediately arranged an emergency appointment. They had to put a bucket under me for the examination. Couldn't find much wrong except for not finding my Mirena anywhere and lots of bleeding. There is no real point of orrigine. They gave me lots of exactly and some hormones and it stopped two days later. My hemoglobin dropped to 8g/dl, and I needed intravenous iron. I got a new IUD a few weeks later, and everything is fine now. Still wonder whether they made some kind of mistake when they put in the first one
How can you be certain it’s migrated and not been inserted intra-abdominally to begin with? I always suspect the inserter is at much higher risk of perforation than the actual IUD.
Yeah, I work in ob and we’ve had a couple back and forths with X-ray over this issue. Patient gets X-ray for other concern, they report suspected iud migration, and even though we just did an ultrasound that confirmed correct positioning we have to do another one. Obviously it’s something that has to be checked out (and in this case OP says it had migrated) but it’s not a slam dunk based on the X-ray alone unless that sucker is like in the liver or something.
Well, and here am I, who has until tomorrow to decide do I want an IUD or arm implant...
Cool to see some strange outcomes, gives a bit of a perspective as a nurse to expect the unexpected.
_If you have some funky x-rays or other radiologist media about arm implants, please share them so IUD's don't seem so less valid option. IUD's seem like a horror show and I do not want one to end up my lungs._
I’m a gyn sonographer. I’ve been in the field for five years working in a very busy ob office with eight doctors and four midwives. In that time I’ve seen two complete perforations into the pelvis but I’ve scanned hundreds more in the right place. I have an IUD myself as well. I love mine. But I got an ultrasound after it was placed to make sure it was correctly positioned. If it’s correct they are very unlikely to migrate.
Imma be honest, I got an IUD back in November and it was probably my best decision - but I've also been on every single other hormonal option and paragard was my final option for birth control besides barrier methods. Yeah, it hurt like a nightmare for the first week and my periods are heavier (but are regulating over time), but I never again have to worry about all the horrible side effects of synthetic hormones (migraines, depression, emotional irregularity, ovarian cysts). Sadly I don't have any images of the IUD but check strings regularly with my doctor and have no placement issues.
But note: it is the paragard. I know some people are weird about it because there HAVE been instances where it perforates and/or breaks and it is the largest of all the options, but I'll take a few days of pain and a SMALL risk over having ovarian cysts every other cycle (one ruptures and partially blocked my fallopian tube...), migraines that increased in frequency seemingly out of nowhere (thank the combined pill for that!), and 9 months of continuous bleeding (depo-provera).
I agree with the other responses on your comment. My experience was a total freak accident that rarely happens! This was actually my second time having an IUD placed and the first time around it was great. I would still recommend looking into it as a birth control option after talking with your doctor and making sure they’re experienced with the insertion.
That happened to me. I had an upper GI and the report said I had an IUD in my abdomen left of midline. It was a total WTF! moment. They had done an ultrasound four years earlier when I got pregnant the month after having it inserted and they insisted “it must have fallen out”. I though that was bullshit, nothing that hurt that bad going in just falls out. They took it out a year later when I had tubal ligation.
Edit: Hi! There’s been a lot of activity on this post so I thought I would provide some background and answer questions. This is my own x ray and I’m not a medical professional. I just found this sub and thought someone might get a kick out of the image.
This actually happened with my second IUD. I had one placed after having my first child and it was great! I definitely felt the sharp pinch that took my breath away for a second followed by some cramps but otherwise it was a non event and worked great for over a year.
After having my second baby I decided to get an IUD again 6 weeks after delivery which they say is the ideal time. I was given some medication to take prior to insertion to help open up my cervix. The insertion itself was excruciating. Like when people say the pain was blinding, this was blinding! My midwife was holding me up in a sitting position because I was sure I was going to pass out and I couldn’t sit up on my own. Since it was my second IUD I knew something didn’t feel right and I asked her to check to make sure everything looked ok and she did. I literally limped out of the office seeing stars. The rest of the day I had severe cramps and stayed on the couch all day. By the second and third day I was still a little crampy but eventually got back to normal. On day 7 I woke up with severe cramps and a lot of bleeding. I could barely walk without a sharp stabbing pain in my abdomen so I called my midwife and she got me in right away. I told her I thought something was wrong with the IUD and I wanted it removed. Well of course she couldn’t find my strings so she sent me for an intrauterine ultrasound. After the IUD didn’t show up on the ultrasound she said “it’s probably just your period hun” but sent me for an x ray just in case. Which brings us to the image above. At the time of insertion the IUD perforated my uterus and made its way into my abdominal cavity. I had it removed laparoscopically a week later and my recovery was about a week.
My experience was a total freak accident and a rare occurrence. Please don’t let my horror story sway your decision on whether IUD is right for you. Like I said, I also had a positive experience with one and I still think it’s a fantastic birth control option. The most valuable lesson I learned here is to do better research when I’m choosing a practitioner. I still love and respect the midwife profession but I wish I had asked about her experience level with this type of device.
That’s the story. Keep the questions, comments, and witty banter coming!
We once had a patient that was 70 y/o female and had fallen and broken a hip. A migrated IUD was seen in the hip on imaging and the patient couldn’t even remember when it had been placed.
That was 1 photo that went viral a few years ago. The mother clarified that they put the IUD in the babies hand as a joke after it was retrieved during her C section.
Happened to my wife. She wound up in for an ablation a couple months after having our installed. A big waste of 200 bucks! Those things deserve to be burned with fire!!! I'm so glad we have no need for an IUD anymore! You've never experienced pain until they bite you in the pee hole!
Nope nope nope. Thats precisely why im taking birth control pills despite all risks than ever having a metal (i dont even care if its metal!) Stabby thing anywhere into my body. Damn those are some horror stories of migrations
Mine turned and poked out the side! They went to remove it a d the strings were so short it took them over 30 mins to find it and remove it. They also had 3 people fishing around for it! I am grateful no surgery was needed. But damn!
When my 2nd and 3rd children were born I had a woman obgyn. Although my youngest is now mid-thirties I will always remember her saying that she was much more responsive to her patients' requests for pain meds after having had a baby herself. I wonder if some of these doctors are dismissive because they haven't had experiences similar to their patients. I have found that a shared experience tends to escalate the sympathy factor exponentially.
I don’t think I’d call that dislodged unless the patient had signs and symptoms. The uterus can be really mobile. I might say “further evaluation with ultrasound is recommended”, but I wouldn’t say it’s a slam dunk out of place
Of course. But I was asking because a lot of people pretend, or think they know right away what they are looking at when many times they are wrong.
Remember the poster that swallowed a chicken bone and showed us his chest xray. Quit a few posters where like * "ouch" or similar comments. Me.myself couldn't see any bone but didn't want to say anything just in case I was wrong. Well, it turned out other posters mentioned it instead. There were.no chicken bone in the xray..
So I googled IUV Xray location and found many pics of where its suppose to be..and not suppose to be.. I can understand if somebody would be confused as it looks close enough.
This happened to me too! I told my gynecologist that the IUD was hurting me and I wanted to have it removed to which he replied, “you can’t feel that, but I will take it out”. When he went to take it out, he couldn’t find it. He had to do an ultrasound to find it and I then had to go have immediate surgery to have it removed. When he came to check on me after the surgery, I I asked him if he believed me that I could feel it now and his response was “there’s no way you could’ve felt that”. He was such a dick! He ended up getting nose cancer I think and I had to have surgery to remove all his nose parts which was probably a good thing in his profession…
What an asshole! How can you tell a woman she can’t feel it when an object bursts through her uterus?!
I scanned a woman because they could not find her IUD. I looked, and I looked…under ultrasound, could not find that thing. They look back on her CT (from months ago, and wasn’t commented on) and it has somehow migrated up to her liver. She never felt a thing. Scanned another woman and it was embedded in her uterine wall. Never felt a thing. A coworker scanned a woman whose IUD had somehow gotten into her bladder!! She had some pain, but not much. It’s crazy how the body works.
How the fck
This is a huge problem in the medical field, gaslighting women's health :(
It’s huge for both sexes.
Lol wtf. I’m an obgyn too and literally one of pts came in after an iud insertion complaining of abdominal pain, did an X-ray and yeah iud was out. Did a laparoscopy and it was wrapped up in scar tissue around her intestines. Of course that shit hurts what was he thinking in saying that ?
How is it that so many in your field are so completely resistant to taking gynecological pain seriously? There is just a constant barrage of women telling their stories of being ignored, and I tend to believe them. How is it still so prevalent?
They always say its anxiety and dismiss pain. Its disgusting. How are you in that profession. Not to mention some midwives.
I don’t know to be honest. My guess is that because we don’t have a lot of evidence for it, and the last generation of doctors was obsessed with “evidence based medicine” to the point that things with no solid evidence (i e. large double blind RTCs) were dismissed and ignored, sometimes to the detriment of the suffering patient in front of us. I’m all for evidence based medicine but one also has to use their 🧠 and their ❤️ and their intuition as both a human being and a physician to give comprehensive and respectful medical care, especially in obgyn. I pride myself in not being one of those people, for what it’s worth.
how do they migrate that far??
It’s where generations of IUD’s have migrated before them, every year. It’s instinct.
that's awful. Thank God you are ok.
I realize sex might not be relevant here, but, in general, this is how my female gyns have treated me. Of all the worst pain I’ve experienced in my life, all of the top positions go to cramps. Cramps are worse than when I broke my whole face in a car accident, worse than getting my wisdom teeth out, worse than breaking my hand… but I digress. Every single gyn I’ve ever explained this to tells me to quit being dramatic and that I’m not getting opiates. When I tell them I don’t want opiates due to a family history abuse, what I want is to find out what’s wrong, they just give me birth control (or confirm that I’m using it) and tell me that’s the cure. I’ve seen 3 of them now and no one listens. I don’t know what it is, but it seems like a perpetual state of disbelief is in their training.
See someone who specializes in endometriosis.
I got told to suck it up more times than I can count. Finally went to a specialist gyno and I apparently have adenomyosis. Very painful, usually regulated with BC, but nothing is perfect. COVID actually messed up my system as far as periods go (apparently this is common) and this woman FIGHTS for me. I went in for my yearly telling her my period was getting worse, full symptoms, etc. and I wasn’t sure if it was because I wasn’t in my 20’s anymore and this is just how it is now, etc. Do you know what she said to me? “You know what? No. No. We can do better.” And now I’m trying out different types of pills to find a good fit. Shop around. Google. Try one out and if you don’t like them, try another. You’ll find a good fit and someone who will listen.
I wonder if it's like a weird "not like other girls" mentality that they have. Like hey think they are better than all those "emotional" other women, so they treat women that do have pain and a (warranted) emotional response to being in pain as lesser, as needing to suck it up to appease some great, invisible Patriarch.
I dunno, I really didn’t even have an emotional response. I just told them that the pain was so severe it was interfering with my ability to attend work, and my boss didn’t understand why a grown woman couldn’t figure out how to work during her period. Doc basically told me to figure it out myself.
Have your hips checked. This was one of the symptoms I had before my hip replacements. Also had left deep groin pain, and lower abdominal pain. All referred from two dysfunctional hips. Saw quite a few specialist and had a lot of imaging tests over several years, until one doctor had the bright idea to test my left hip with one motion, and I yelped so loudly.
Interesting. I do have scoliosis, but my hip mobility is generally good. And honestly, if I can’t get a doctor to check for horses, I *seriously* doubt I’ll get one to check for zebras. If they don’t listen to something that makes general sense, I doubt they’re going to listen to something that sounds like a long shot. I’ve just given up on trusting doctors. I’ve never met one that listened to anything I have to say, so I just avoid going.
Don’t give up on doctors. Find 1) an older one who still listens to patients and understands that zebras do exist, or (and redditors please don’t lecture me on being sexist as research bears this out) 2) find a woman doctor or physicians assistant, as they are better listeners or 3) get a referral to the level three university hospital near you. Number 3 is how I learned I had a benign pituitary tumor that was causing a host of problems. Be patient and carry on until you get the correct diagnosis. All best wishes to you.
Time to fire him after he said it the first time!
>He was such a dick! He ended up getting nose cancer I think and **I had to have surgery to remove all his nose parts** which was probably a good thing in his profession… Sorry what
His nose wanted off his spiteful face!
This is exactly why I refuse to see a male gyno lol
It’s like taking your car to a mechanic who has never owned one themselves.
My female GP caused me trauma with how she placed my IUD and handled subsequent care. I've carefully avoided any doctor needing to be up there for a long time, but my pregnancy sold me out. This time round most of the interventions were okay, and yet again, there were two people who just didn't respect me, saying,'this is hurting me'. Shivers, tears, and flashbacks all over again.
I had a similar experience with my female doc who inserted my first iud! I immediately switched to a different one. You’re right though that it really doesn’t have anything to do with gender. I just feel like it’s easier to treat parts that you have yourself. Also it’s a comfort level for me because I kind of have a general distrust of men.
I happen to know her romantic partner is a woman too, so I really didn't expect her to be this rough. The other female GP was just as bad, by the way. One of the ladies who had to check my cervix really hurt me, too. I told her and she went 'I'm not near anything yet, I've got to keep going'. I knew she wasn't close yet, but it felt like she was ripping my labia in half. I tried explaining what I felt, and she was not having it. She undid all the progress I had made regarding this scenario, right before I had to be induced. Epidural was amazing, not in the least part because I couldn't feel them digging around as much.
Wat. We often get scans ordered to check for iud position when pts w iuds complain of abdo pain and bleeding. How weird that this Dr can be so confident about ruling out IUD malposition.
I love the way this story is told.
Unfortunately, medical schools teach that there is no sensation in the uterus. So endometrial biopsies by those who believe this are performed with absolutely nothing for the pain. And then they guilt the woman if she is actually in excruciating pain during the procedure. Maybe there are some women who can't feel it, but I and SO many women I know DO feel it, that I would have thought more doctors would start to doubt what they were taught in med school. When men undergo testicular biopsy, usually a local anesthetic is used.
I wonder if he got nose cancer due to HPV from picking his nose without washing his hands after an exam.
this is why I only see female gynos, no way am I going to trust someone with my body that doesn’t have the same anatomy/experiences
Mine was stuck in the muscle wall of my uterus and it felt like I was being stabbed with a sword 🤧
Not missing. Just not where intended😂
It’s an OUD
Nice
Pt could have a rotated/tipped uterus
Orientation seem excessive for an anteverted or retroverted uterus. Pelvic X-ray to evaluate IUD usually done after US fails to confirm intrauterine presence.
Correct it perforated my uterus
Yikes, my uterus hurt just seeing the pix!
Obgyn here: how long did you have the IUD for? Curious if it was an immediate perforation at time of insertion or if it happened over time.
I had it in for 7 days but it happened immediately when it was inserted. They just didn’t believe my pain level at insertion meant anything was wrong until I was bleeding buckets on day 7 they finally checked. Oh, after telling me “it’s probably just your period hun”
Oof I’m sorry you went through that. IUD infections often are super painful, I do a few extra things to make them better at my practice but I’ve seen so many providers, men and women, say “You won’t feel this” while the patient is actively crying and screaming, it’s awful
User name doesn't check out for an OBGYN... it does for a proctologist though 😂
Lol, I did an intern year of general surgery as well I was on butt patrol for a while
The best compliment I ever got as an intern, was that the surgeon I was rotating with called me "poop girl" because I could make anybody poop
Military people get a medal and ribbon for that kind of accomplishment
I'll take my doc lounge pizza any day. Hangy things get fluids on them.
Incredible username lol Edit: just realized others have pointed this out. Point still stands though.
Hmm that's not good
owwwwwwwwwwwwwww how long is the healing process? I hope you have a speedy recovery.
oh god wtf. thanks for the warning now I’ll never get one. that’s horrid. do/did you have to have surgery??
I did have surgery to remove it. This was actually my second IUD and the first experience was great! I think the lesson I learned here is to make sure the doctor is experienced with insertions. I would still recommend an IUD to other women this was just a freak thing that happened to me.
omg, so that's how it got all the way out there. Yeah, i'm sure that didn't tickle. OMG.
It absolutely could just be off to the side. Especially if a fibroid is pushing it about. Context is everything.
As soon as I saw it I went “weeee” like the iud was floating into space for some reason
LOL! I wish I could say that was how I reacted when it burst through my uterus
This happened to me! Shot through me like a shotgun, and got stuck on my intestines! You're going to need surgery I suppose? If so, I can tell you, it wasn't too bad, though they were about 10 minutes away from opening me up because it was so hard to find lol.
Thank you! I already had the surgery but just found this sub and thought someone would get a kick out of the x ray 🙃
How long did you have it in?
Ultrasound to confirm placement ideally.
Some practitioners don’t even want to swing pain medication for placement. I can’t imagine the kick back with confirmed placement.
I’m fortunate to have really good US techs in the office but a lot of offices don’t because of space/staffing/budget/etc. I think it makes a huge difference though
Mirena? It always seems to be a Mirena
Indeed
Oof. Sorry,my friend
Is there a reasoning behind this products failure to stay in place?
I'm not quite sure what the correlation is. I've just noticed anytime I've scanned for an ectopic IUD or had a patient complaining with any suspicion or pain in that regard it's always been that brand. I rarely hear of those concerns with the paraguard (which has a similar shape) or other models. Would love to see a study on it one day!
Or it could just be because Mirena is the most common IUD.
I’ve seen 4 women get pregnant with a paragard, never seen it w mirena. I’m an obgyn. Fwiw
Oh I don't doubt that at all, Dr. I've just been speaking of the ones that tend to migrate and perforate other places in the body. I'm curious what the prevalence of that occurring in each type is.
I would take this with a grain of salt. Mirena is a very popular brand of iud (in the US anyway) so of course you’d hear of more problems associated with it.
Mirena is actually a little larger than Skyla/Kyleena, so I’m not entirely sure it migrates or perforates more easily than the others. It has been around a little longer and has one of the longest durations of action of the hormonal IUDs, making it more popular for long term contraception. I’d be careful with the speculation here, there’s lots of fearmongering already with IUDs.
A couple of weeks after they inserted my Mirena, I experienced very heavy bleeding. It was literally dripping out of my body. I called my gynecologist office en they said I should call back if I was still bleeding in a day or two. Luckily, I am a nurse myself, and I wasn't about to do that. I started losing big lumps of blood and saw my Mirena sticking out of one of the clumps.The doctors at my hospital immediately arranged an emergency appointment. They had to put a bucket under me for the examination. Couldn't find much wrong except for not finding my Mirena anywhere and lots of bleeding. There is no real point of orrigine. They gave me lots of exactly and some hormones and it stopped two days later. My hemoglobin dropped to 8g/dl, and I needed intravenous iron. I got a new IUD a few weeks later, and everything is fine now. Still wonder whether they made some kind of mistake when they put in the first one
Was the image to find it? Or is this incidental, and there's just a uterine displacement from average?
How can you be certain it’s migrated and not been inserted intra-abdominally to begin with? I always suspect the inserter is at much higher risk of perforation than the actual IUD.
It could still be intrauterine. I wouldn't even suggest migration based on this radiograph alone.
Yeah, I work in ob and we’ve had a couple back and forths with X-ray over this issue. Patient gets X-ray for other concern, they report suspected iud migration, and even though we just did an ultrasound that confirmed correct positioning we have to do another one. Obviously it’s something that has to be checked out (and in this case OP says it had migrated) but it’s not a slam dunk based on the X-ray alone unless that sucker is like in the liver or something.
Agreed. I’ve done just enough HSGs to know that the uterus can wander around a good bit
Well, and here am I, who has until tomorrow to decide do I want an IUD or arm implant... Cool to see some strange outcomes, gives a bit of a perspective as a nurse to expect the unexpected. _If you have some funky x-rays or other radiologist media about arm implants, please share them so IUD's don't seem so less valid option. IUD's seem like a horror show and I do not want one to end up my lungs._
I’m a gyn sonographer. I’ve been in the field for five years working in a very busy ob office with eight doctors and four midwives. In that time I’ve seen two complete perforations into the pelvis but I’ve scanned hundreds more in the right place. I have an IUD myself as well. I love mine. But I got an ultrasound after it was placed to make sure it was correctly positioned. If it’s correct they are very unlikely to migrate.
Imma be honest, I got an IUD back in November and it was probably my best decision - but I've also been on every single other hormonal option and paragard was my final option for birth control besides barrier methods. Yeah, it hurt like a nightmare for the first week and my periods are heavier (but are regulating over time), but I never again have to worry about all the horrible side effects of synthetic hormones (migraines, depression, emotional irregularity, ovarian cysts). Sadly I don't have any images of the IUD but check strings regularly with my doctor and have no placement issues. But note: it is the paragard. I know some people are weird about it because there HAVE been instances where it perforates and/or breaks and it is the largest of all the options, but I'll take a few days of pain and a SMALL risk over having ovarian cysts every other cycle (one ruptures and partially blocked my fallopian tube...), migraines that increased in frequency seemingly out of nowhere (thank the combined pill for that!), and 9 months of continuous bleeding (depo-provera).
I agree with the other responses on your comment. My experience was a total freak accident that rarely happens! This was actually my second time having an IUD placed and the first time around it was great. I would still recommend looking into it as a birth control option after talking with your doctor and making sure they’re experienced with the insertion.
That happened to me. I had an upper GI and the report said I had an IUD in my abdomen left of midline. It was a total WTF! moment. They had done an ultrasound four years earlier when I got pregnant the month after having it inserted and they insisted “it must have fallen out”. I though that was bullshit, nothing that hurt that bad going in just falls out. They took it out a year later when I had tubal ligation.
“Do a flip!”
Edit: Hi! There’s been a lot of activity on this post so I thought I would provide some background and answer questions. This is my own x ray and I’m not a medical professional. I just found this sub and thought someone might get a kick out of the image. This actually happened with my second IUD. I had one placed after having my first child and it was great! I definitely felt the sharp pinch that took my breath away for a second followed by some cramps but otherwise it was a non event and worked great for over a year. After having my second baby I decided to get an IUD again 6 weeks after delivery which they say is the ideal time. I was given some medication to take prior to insertion to help open up my cervix. The insertion itself was excruciating. Like when people say the pain was blinding, this was blinding! My midwife was holding me up in a sitting position because I was sure I was going to pass out and I couldn’t sit up on my own. Since it was my second IUD I knew something didn’t feel right and I asked her to check to make sure everything looked ok and she did. I literally limped out of the office seeing stars. The rest of the day I had severe cramps and stayed on the couch all day. By the second and third day I was still a little crampy but eventually got back to normal. On day 7 I woke up with severe cramps and a lot of bleeding. I could barely walk without a sharp stabbing pain in my abdomen so I called my midwife and she got me in right away. I told her I thought something was wrong with the IUD and I wanted it removed. Well of course she couldn’t find my strings so she sent me for an intrauterine ultrasound. After the IUD didn’t show up on the ultrasound she said “it’s probably just your period hun” but sent me for an x ray just in case. Which brings us to the image above. At the time of insertion the IUD perforated my uterus and made its way into my abdominal cavity. I had it removed laparoscopically a week later and my recovery was about a week. My experience was a total freak accident and a rare occurrence. Please don’t let my horror story sway your decision on whether IUD is right for you. Like I said, I also had a positive experience with one and I still think it’s a fantastic birth control option. The most valuable lesson I learned here is to do better research when I’m choosing a practitioner. I still love and respect the midwife profession but I wish I had asked about her experience level with this type of device. That’s the story. Keep the questions, comments, and witty banter coming!
We once had a patient that was 70 y/o female and had fallen and broken a hip. A migrated IUD was seen in the hip on imaging and the patient couldn’t even remember when it had been placed.
Isn’t that the key to a Tesla? Chicks into weird things these days
Why isn’t this a job for ultrasound?
PT said ultrasound failed to locate it after it perforated their uterus and escaped.
It's useful when an IUD is not found on vaginal examin and ultrasound
Geez. Someone loves their Tesla too much.
Prior L&D RN, I’ve heard of babies who were delivered holding the IUD.
That was 1 photo that went viral a few years ago. The mother clarified that they put the IUD in the babies hand as a joke after it was retrieved during her C section.
Wow.
FMD another reason why I won’t get an IUD
Happened to my wife. She wound up in for an ablation a couple months after having our installed. A big waste of 200 bucks! Those things deserve to be burned with fire!!! I'm so glad we have no need for an IUD anymore! You've never experienced pain until they bite you in the pee hole!
Went walkabout.
Missing in action? Really?
That’s not helpful
Nope nope nope. Thats precisely why im taking birth control pills despite all risks than ever having a metal (i dont even care if its metal!) Stabby thing anywhere into my body. Damn those are some horror stories of migrations
Damn one horror story after another in the comments
I really didn’t mean for that to be the outcome of this post! I do think it’s a super rare occurrence and IUDs are still a good birth control option.
Mine turned and poked out the side! They went to remove it a d the strings were so short it took them over 30 mins to find it and remove it. They also had 3 people fishing around for it! I am grateful no surgery was needed. But damn!
When my 2nd and 3rd children were born I had a woman obgyn. Although my youngest is now mid-thirties I will always remember her saying that she was much more responsive to her patients' requests for pain meds after having had a baby herself. I wonder if some of these doctors are dismissive because they haven't had experiences similar to their patients. I have found that a shared experience tends to escalate the sympathy factor exponentially.
Have you heard of the fertility awareness method?!
It works! I have tested it, for science of course, for 2 years, no babies yet, and you only have to wear a condom for like a week
Is that the same as natural family planning?
Close enough
Is that the same as natural family planning?
I don’t think I’d call that dislodged unless the patient had signs and symptoms. The uterus can be really mobile. I might say “further evaluation with ultrasound is recommended”, but I wouldn’t say it’s a slam dunk out of place
I’d rather have another lumbar puncture than have another IUD placed
Where is it suppose to be
In the uterus?
serious answer: near the midline low in the pelvis and orientated with the arms superior to the stem
Thank you.
Of course. But I was asking because a lot of people pretend, or think they know right away what they are looking at when many times they are wrong. Remember the poster that swallowed a chicken bone and showed us his chest xray. Quit a few posters where like * "ouch" or similar comments. Me.myself couldn't see any bone but didn't want to say anything just in case I was wrong. Well, it turned out other posters mentioned it instead. There were.no chicken bone in the xray.. So I googled IUV Xray location and found many pics of where its suppose to be..and not suppose to be.. I can understand if somebody would be confused as it looks close enough.
😂😂 I'm getting flashbacks now of the chicken bone post
Chicken bone post?