I had a lap on Tuesday and they found hydrosalpinx in my left tube. Basically, it was very inflamed and enlarged and completely adhered along one side to my uterus. They removed the tube.
My right tube/ovary was normal.
I was very surprised as over the past four years of ivf, etc I have had many, many ultrasounds, a couple of CT scans, an MRI, a lap for egg retrieval, etc, etc, etc... I have even had a dye study for tubal patency when I started way back when :/ It has never been picked up.
My question is, how quickly can this condition develop? Months? Years??
I'm obviously upset, but especially as my understanding is that I never had a chance of an embryo implanting with the tube being like that as it is toxic and would kill off any embryo trying to grow in my uterus.
Apparently it's secondary to a pelvic infection, have you had one recently? I find it hard to believe that no-one noticed so much damage during any of your other procedures. Can they check back over your previous scans to see if there were signs that they missed?
I was in hospital for five days in February with "suspected acute pelvic abscesses". They also diagnosed endo (which I obviously didnt/don't have).
The surgeon said my tube was a mess. I guess it must be from February??? But I can't help wondering if it has been going on longer??
The other thing is my left ovary has always been very, very hard to find via ultrasound. So much so that for my egg collection last December, the FS had to do a lap because he couldn't locate my left ovary transvaginally.
The note from my CT scan in Feb say this...
"complex cystic and solid bilateral ovarian masses, left larger than right. Associated inflammatory stranding in the left para ovarian region within the adnexa and associated loss of fat plane between the adjacent sigmoid colon and the ovarian mass".
I can't translate, but I had a hycosy in 2010, I think around august, which found that my left tube was partially blocked. I was told it was most likely from pid that I contracted after a d&c. I had the d&c mid 2008, and the infection went unchecked for 3 months. I'm not sure if any of that helps, but that was the timeline of the damage for me.
I can only kinda translate... A scientist not a doctor but I've done lots of reading on Fallopian tubes due to my ectopics.
It seems to make sense to me that your experience in February would have been the problem. It might have been bad since then or it might have caused the adhesion and made the tube more susceptible to this recent flare up (is that why you had the recent lap?)
Sounds like in feb you had some abscesses around both ovaries and the inflammation had spread to your left tube (they often can't see the actual tubes on scans, only the area where the tubes are which is called the adnexa). Loss of fat plane... I think that means everything was really swollen and so it's not surprising that you got adhesions from that.
As for the time before feburary, one thought I had, and I'm not sure if it's logical, is that maybe your tube and ovary were in a bit of a weird place or had some previous adhesions, and that's what made it susceptible to being infected. The surgeon that did your egg retrieval lap might be able to tell you more about how the anatomy looked before the infection?
Are you upset that they removed the tube? I think that even though it was toxic now, as it healed it would have been a big risk for ectopics so I think they made the right call there. Really good news that your right tube looks good!!
Praying that it's smooth sailing from here and you get your bubba soon.
Thank you. I just rang the hospital and spoke to a nurse about my pain/bleeding. I asked her and she said it can happen quite quickly so February seems likely :/
I guess we will never know for sure though. I highly doubt I will get pregnant now, given my age and having one tube, etc but I guess it is better being as healthy as I can be in there.
The gynae told me that if you lose a tube, the other takes over it's job so I guess there is still hope for you N2L. I know it is easy for me to say that as I'm not going through it, but you have one tube, there is still some chance surely? Hugsxx
Yeah having one tube doesn't technically reduce your fertility, it just means it can take a little longer than it might have cos only every second month (on average) counts. But in about 30% of cases an egg from the left will go into the right tube anyway!!
It actually gave me more hope cos on months that I didn't get pregnant I just thought "oh must have been wrong side" instead of "wtf is wrong with me!!"
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Hydrosalpinx
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