From Ahora.cu
By Redaction Ahora
email: redaccion@ahora.cu
April 2009

The use of natural medicine, particularly acupuncture, has broadened the treatment prospects for uterine fibroids, which affect one every three women in Cuba.

As an initiative of Pinar del Rio’s gynecologist Ana Rodriguez Núñez, the therapeutic alternative is implemented on a regular basis at the Comandante Pinares General Hospital, after being successfully used for the first time in the island in Santiago de Cuba. In 2008, some 200 women affected with this benign tumor were treated in that eastern province.

Reports by the gynecologists’ team confirm an improvement in the patient’s condition between the first and third sessions, as confirmed by periodic abdominal and transvaginal ultrasound tests.

This method is 6.2 times less expensive than surgery, reduces the discomfort and in most cases eliminates the most frequent symptoms such as pain, menstrual disorders or the combination of both.

Other procedures are under study to remove uterine fibroids without affecting the uterus, like radiation and hormone therapy; however, if those treatments can not fix the problem, the patient must undergo surgery, applied in 24 percent of cases.

The Comandante Pinares Hospital was opened 26 years ago by Fidel Castro. It has become a teaching hospital, so in addition to providing medical care to patients from the municipalities of the east of Pinar del Rio, it offers clinical education and training for future and current doctors, nurses, and other health professionals.