Johns Hopkins Medicine
Office of Corporate Communications
Media contact: David March
410-955-1534; dmarch1@jhmi.edu
MARCH 14, 2005
UTERINE FIBROID TREATMENT AND RESEARCH IS FOCUS OF NEW HOPKINS CENTER
Johns Hopkins Medicine has opened a new center for treating and investigating the causes of uterine fibroids, a medical condition that afflicts millions of American women. The center will specialize in state-of-the-art therapies for the condition and in the rapid application of new research to the treatment of these mostly benign growths of the wall of the uterus.
Fibroids, which can vary in number and range in size from a small pea to as large as a grapefruit or small melon, may result in excessive bleeding, anemia, infertility, and excessive pressure on the bladder and bowel. An estimated one-third of the 600,000 hysterectomies performed each year in the United States are due to fibroids.
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John Griffith, M.D., M.P.H., Director, Fibroid Center |
“Our research-based resources distinguish the Hopkins program from others in the field,” says Griffith, who will lead a team of one dozen faculty and 40 additional staff that includes interventional radiologists, reproductive endocrinologists, geneticists, nurses and public health experts.
On the treatment side, the Hopkins team will emphasize minimally invasive techniques that focus on removing or shrinking fibroids instead of surgically removing the entire uterus. Particular attention will be paid to preserving the uterus for women who have not completed childbearing.
The cause of fibroids is unknown, but excess estrogen is believed to play a role in their development, and hormone therapy is often used to shrink tumors.
“For benign fibroids, many women undergo hysterectomy, the most common abdominal surgery for women in the United States,” says interventional radiologist Hyun “Kevin” Kim, M.D., an assistant professor at Hopkins. “Our goal is to develop and offer new, minimally invasive therapies for women.”
Kim adds that laparoscopic, or minimally invasive, procedures are the current trend, allowing physicians to shrink fibroids and avoid the complications, inconvenience and pain associated with open surgical options. Uterine artery embolization is one such procedure, in which tiny plastic pellets are used to block blood flow to the fibroid tumors, starving them of nutrients and oxygen. The pellets are implanted using a thin catheter threaded from the groin to the uterine arteries. Although embolization requires pain medication and an overnight hospital stay, the recovery period lasts slightly longer than one week.
Another current treatment option available at Hopkins uses ultrasound energy to shrink fibroid tumors. Magnetic resonance imaging is used to guide the focused ultrasound therapy to fibers of the tumor. Although the procedure can require the patient to spend up to three hours in the MRI, there are no incisions or hospital stayovers.
Griffith notes that research comparing treatment options is urgently needed to determine which procedure is best for particular women. “No definitive answer to ‘what should be done’ currently exists,” he says, either for patients or physicians. The goal of the Hopkins center is to conduct evidence-based research to address this problem.
Located at Johns Hopkins’ facilities at Green Spring Station, 10755 Falls Rd., in Lutherville, Md., the center will be open during regular business hours: 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday to Friday. Patient visits are by appointment only and can be made by calling the Hopkins access number, 410-583-2749. More information about Hopkins’ Fibroid Center and its services is available on the Internet at: http://womenshealth.jhmi.edu/gyn/conditions/fibroids.html.
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