Endometriosis & Pelvic Pain | Vital Health Endometriosis Center

Miss USA contestant Joins the Fight for Endo Awareness

Vital Health Endometriosis Centers — Thu, 08 Oct 2020 19:51:06 +0000

Vital Health patient Justice Enlow, Miss Tennessee USA 2020 fights for endo awareness as she strives to empower other women with endometriosis to find life-changing treatment as she did at Vital Health Endometriosis Center.

“I believe that every woman deserves a life ruled by their passions, purpose, and dreams rather than by pain.” — Justice Enlow, Miss Tennessee USA 2020

Justice suffered for 10 years with symptoms of endometriosis, including painful periods, digestive issues, chronic abdominal and pelvic pain, and extreme fatigue. She says, “The pain got so bad that I ended up on prescription pain medication and missed a significant portion of my college classes.”

Misdiagnoses are too common, but you can get your life back

In those painful 10 years, Justice sought treatment from her doctors and was misdiagnosed several times. Her life changed when she found Vital Health Endometriosis Center and internationally renowned endometriosis specialist Dr. Andrew S. Cook, M.D.

“Dr. Cook and the entire staff at Vital Health Institute were an answer to my prayers,” she says. “They were the first medical professionals that I spoke with who validated my pain but also gave me hope for my future. I am now almost 3 years post-op and can honestly say that Dr. Cook gave me back my life.”

Living her dream and using her platform to empower women with endo

Today, Justice is spreading awareness and fighting for other women with endometriosis in her role as Miss Tennessee USA 2020. And now, by competing in Miss USA 2020 pageant, she feels she has an even greater opportunity to raise awareness. Her platform is empowering women with endometriosis to be their own health advocates in finding treatment.

“I am living out my dream of competing for Miss USA because of the amazing care that I received at Vital Health Institute,” she says. Justice is also the founder of Justice For Women, a non-profit that believes “no person, prejudice, or health concern should stand between a woman and her purpose.”

Understanding the difference an Endometriosis Specialist makes

Endometriosis is a leading cause of chronic pelvic pain in women, and it can have a dramatic effect on all aspects of a woman’s quality of life. In addition to being misdiagnosed, many women, before being treated by Dr. Cook, have undergone one, and sometimes multiple, failed surgeries that use outdated techniques such as ablation. Dr. Cook has created a hashtag on Instagram called #BanTheBurn in an effort to bring awareness to and save women from the pain and trauma they are experiencing in these failed surgeries. Justice remarked “I will forever be grateful that Dr. Cook was the one and only surgeon that I saw.” Her fight to raise awareness will help combat the many myths that exist regarding endometriosis. On her website, she talks about her treatment journey in more detail, here.

Next Steps

Read more about “What it Really Means to have Endometriosis” and download the full PDF guide to share with friends and family here.
You may also request a screen-share virtual consult to discuss your specific case with Dr. Cook.
The Vital Health team wants to help you get your life back, just as we were able to help Justice and many other women like her. Use this form to request a complimentary record review.

Help Justice raise awareness by spreading the word.

The post Miss USA contestant Joins the Fight for Endo Awareness appeared first on Vital Health Endometriosis Center.

Surgical Video: Adhesiolysis – Removal of Adhesions/Scar Tissue

Vital Health Endometriosis Centers — Tue, 25 Aug 2020 19:19:40 +0000

Surgical Video: Adhesiolysis - Removal of Adhesions/Scar Tissue

https://www.vitalhealth.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/endosurgeryvideo.mp4

SOUND On!! Adhesions are scars that form within the body. They usually form in the abdomen or pelvis. Adhesions can develop after surgery as part of the healing process. If surgery is rough the chance is much higher than if good gentle techniques are used. They can also develop after infection or any other inflammatory process, such as Endometriosis. Lysis of adhesions is the process of cutting scar tissue within the body. This is done to restore normal function and reduce pain.

This clip shows how to remove scar tissue with minimal amount of trauma to the tissue. This patient developed adhesions (scar tissue) between the abdominal wall and the omentum, following a previous surgery. The abdominal wall or “tummy wall” appears at the top of the video (the ceiling if you will) since we are looking through the belly button inside of the abdomen. The omentum is a curtain of fat which is attached to the bottom part of the stomach near the level of our ribs. In this case the omentum became scarred to the abdominal wall following a general surgical procedure resulting in pain and discomfort.

Dr. Cook shows how to separate the adhesions using the Carbon 13 CO2 laser, which is one of the most precise and gentle surgical instruments available. He describes the procedure in detail and demonstrates important aspects of good surgical technique.
Did you develop adhesions from surgery?

From our Instagram

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SOUND On!! Adhesions are scars that form within the body. They usually form in the abdomen or pelvis. Adhesions can develop after surgery as part of the healing process. If surgery is rough the chance is much higher than if good gentle techniques are used. They can also develop after infection or any other inflammatory process, such as Endometriosis. Lysis of adhesions is the process of cutting scar tissue within the body. This is done to restore normal function and reduce pain. This clip shows how to remove scar tissue with minimal amount of trauma to the tissue. This patient developed adhesions (scar tissue) between the abdominal wall and the omentum, following a previous surgery. The abdominal wall or “tummy wall” appears at the top of the video (the ceiling if you will) since we are looking through the belly button inside of the abdomen. The omentum is a curtain of fat which is attached to the bottom part of the stomach near the level of our ribs. In this case the omentum became scarred to the abdominal wall following a general surgical procedure resulting in pain and discomfort. Dr. Cook shows how to separate the adhesions using the Carbon 13 CO2 laser, which is one of the most precise and gentle surgical instruments available. He describes the procedure in detail and demonstrates important aspects of good surgical technique. Did you develop adhesions from surgery?

A post shared by Dr. Andrew Cook | Vital Health (@vitalhealthendometriosis) on Aug 19, 2020 at 10:57am PDT

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Video: Key cause of pelvic pain for women with endometriosis discovered

Vital Health Endometriosis Centers — Fri, 26 Jul 2019 02:42:31 +0000

TRANSCRIPT: Key cause of pelvic pain for women with endometriosis discovered

Hi, I’m here with some exciting news. There was actually a study published earlier this month, that is showing one of the key causes of the reason for pelvic pain in women with endometriosis.

This team focused on the type of immune cell; a white blood cell called the macrophage. And macrophage comes from Greek term, big eater, “macro,” big “phage” eater. And really, they’re kind of the garbage collectors, or they eat up different things, actually I have a picture here of one eating some bacteria.

And so, they’ll eat bacteria cells as they’re dying off, and a variety of other things, they kind of clean up the place. And then, depending on where in the body and what the role is, they’ll actually release different substances that help, so in the case if there’s not enough oxygen and a tissue is trying to heal it will stimulate new blood vessel growth. So, they can really be good and helpful in the body. But it turns out that the local environment, the signals can change the behavior of these macrophages. And it turns out that they’re actually drawn into the endometriosis lesions, so if you look in the endometriosis lesions themselves they are packed full of these macrophages.

And It turns out, they’re kind of macrophages gone bad. Because it turns out that what they’ve discovered is that under the influence of endometriosis the macrophages are then producing what’s called insulin like growth factor 1 or IGF-1. And what that does is stimulate the nerve cells to grow and culture and actually become more sensitive. So it’s a way of creating oversensitivity, kind of like a sunburn inside. And so, this is a great understanding and again, macrophages, if you don’t remember the word, you’ve got “MGB” macrophages gone bad. So, you know, they can be good, but these are kind of turned into juvenile delinquents, and they’re raising havoc in the pelvis.

But part of the good news is that this information allows us a new venue of study, to better understand and hopefully provide better treatment. So, both pain relief and maybe even as a way to tag the endo so we can find it and get rid of it one way or another.

So for you, geekoids out there, the title of the article:

Macrophage-derived insulin-like growth factor-1 is a key neurotrophic and nerve-sensitizing factor in pain associated with endometriosis.

So, let me know what you think. I know this is getting a little bit more technical, but I’ve always been of the belief that women with endo are very educated, very smart, and very capable. So just trying to pass this information on to you and I think it’s a great study. All right. Take care.

Click here to read the study

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Video: The Stages of Endometriosis explained by Dr. Cook

Vital Health Endometriosis Centers — Fri, 10 May 2019 06:24:14 +0000

Click here to download the ASRM Form

TRANSCRIPT
Dr Andrew Cook: Hi guys, good morning, Dr.Cook. Today we’re going to talk about classification of endometriosis. I get a lot of questions asking “what stage is my endometriosis?” This is the ASRM, American Society for Reproductive Medicine classification system, and what I am going to show you, some high-tech video features here. This will be on the website also. This is the worksheet for endometriosis classification, and you can see we have stage 1, 2, 3, and 4. It’s a point system – the maximum number of points allowable is 150 so you can see stage 1 is 1-5, stage 2, 6-15, and stage 3, is 16 and above. Now, there are three basic categories, we have endometriosis in this upper dark box, adhesions or scar tissue is all down below and then there is the posterior cul-de-sac, so let’s go through it one section at a time.

I’ve often said that if it’s not in the ovary deep an endometrioma chocolate cyst, it cannot be any more than stage 2 and the reason is we have peritoneum for endometriosis and ovary, so there are two basic locations we are looking for endometriosis. Peritoneum can be superficial or deep and if we go over into each of these columns less than one centimeter, which is about 3/8 of an inch, 1-3cm. 3cm is a little over an inch and greater than 3cm. So if it’s all over the peritoneum, the peritoneum is the inside lining of the pelvis, if it all over the peritoneum and superficial it’s 4 points. So you only get 4 points if it’s just on the surface of the peritoneum.

If it’s deep, in other words, it goes a little bit deeper than the surface of the peritoneum, 6 points so that barely gets you to Stage 2. So again if you don’t have any scar tissue, don’t have endo in the ovaries, the most you can be is a 1 or 2, and we all know stage 1 or 2 can be more painful than a stage 3 or 4. Now for the ovary, superficial endometriosis on the surface of the ovary or deep an endometrioma, less than one centimeter 1-3 and greater than 3, so greater than 3 you get 20 points right there so if you have an endometrioma in 1 ovary and that’s it you are stage 3. So you have the right and the left. So for endometriosis, you can get a maximum of 46 points. That’s it, so yes you could get into stage 4 with that.

The posterior cul-de-sac, the area behind the uterus and the bowel, partial so you know it’s almost like a zipper so the bowel starts to scar to the back of the uterus and that’s obliteration of the cul-de-sac. Complete obliteration right there you get 40 points, right there you are stage 4.

Okay then we have adhesions and remember this was made to try to predict the chance of getting pregnant after surgery not the degree of pain and we know it does not do that. That’s what the EFI or Endometriosis Fertility Index is about. Ok adhesions/scar tissue, two areas, the ovary or Fallopian tube. You have filmy, which is kinda like spider webs, you know just thin stuff, dense, things are glued together so then it’s less than ⅓ enclosure ⅓-⅔ and greater than a ⅔ enclosure. So you can get a total of 4 points if your ovary has filmy adhesions all around it, if it’s encased in adhesions then that’s 16. So each right and left ovary scar tissue, Fallopian tube, right and left Fallopian tube, so you can see really we have the numbering – it depends on how much endometriosis you have but if it’s all over inside, you really are a stage 1, maybe a stage 2. That’s where they were trying to guess at the time what affects fertility and the thinking was if the ovaries or tubes are affected by endometriosis or scar tissue then it’s bad. So invasive endometriosis really stage 3 and 4, noninvasive stage 1 or 2.

So hopefully that helps, but I think part of what I want to do is educate you guys on how to do the staging, what is a proper diagnostic laparoscopy. And again we all know right now a lot of patients know more than their doctor, but let’s get the correct information so you guys are informed, smart consumers. And that’s how we are going to change the way endometriosis is treated altogether. Alrighty, have a great weekend talk to you later!

Click here to download the ASRM Form

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The Durango Herald welcomes Vital Health to Colorado

Vital Health Endometriosis Centers — Thu, 02 May 2019 18:41:19 +0000

Vital Health Endometriosis Centers has opened a new location in Durango, Colorado. Special thanks to The Durango Herald for helping to welcome us to the region in their very informative article about endometriosis. Durango is easily accessible from the Four Corners region with direct flights from Denver, Dallas, and Phoenix.
Visit the Durango location at 1199 Main Ave., Suite #217, Durango, CO 81301-4158.

Endometriosis is often misunderstood by many doctors and can cause years of discomfort and agonizing pain.

Dr. Andrew Cook of Vital Health Endometriosis Centers is an internationally known endometriosis specialist that works with women who have had endometriosis for years and gone through many failed surgeries.

Endometriosis is pretty common, affecting 1 in 10 women of the reproductive age in the U.S. This painful condition takes place when tissue appears outside the uterus in the body cavity and can cause infertility.

There are multiple types of endometriosis depending on where the tissue growth is occurring. It can be found on the ovaries, fallopian tubes, bladder, and tissue lining the pelvis.

Many doctors dismiss endometriosis sufferers, saying they are just having a painful period, the pain is in their heads, or they want to obtain pain pills.

But Dr. Cook listens to his patients and their symptoms to diagnose them correctly, often with endometriosis. He sees approximately 600 patients per year. Read their testimonials.

About 70% of Dr. Cook’s patients travel from around the world to receive treatment from him.

Endometriosis invades and destroys tissue, so Dr. Andrew Cook treats it similar to how cancer is treated, removing it completely. He cuts out the healthy tissue bordering the endometriosis to ensure that it doesn’t come back. Most doctors just burn away the endometriosis tissue, which later returns.

Of the surgeries that Dr. Cook performs, about 50% of patients are relieved of all their pain.

Vital Health Endometriosis Centers has locations in Los Gatos, California and now Durango, Colorado. Dr. Cook spends about 4 or 5 months a year in Durango.

Start Your Healing Journey Now

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The “Pregnancy Cures Endometriosis” Myth

Vital Health Endometriosis Centers — Fri, 16 Mar 2018 00:31:51 +0000

This myth can actually be traced back to Hippocrates in 5th century BC. He believed that women had “wandering wombs” that caused “hysteria” and that only by having sex and procreation with a man, would they be cured.

I’d like to believe we’ve advanced our thinking since then, but unfortunately with the current American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology (ACOG) endometriosis guidelines, and the lack of clinical evidence around endometriosis and women’s health in general, myths like these can prevail in the clinical setting. As a physician, it’s difficult to see OB-GYN’s in 2018 “prescribe” pregnancy as a cure for endometriosis when it is patently untrue.

Now, is it true that if a woman’s pain is only a few days around her period she may get relief during her pregnancy and for a period of time following delivery, especially if she is breastfeeding. Some women may experience a generalized decrease in pain while pregnant. This is most likely due to hormonal changes and possibly a result of autoimmune features of pregnancy and stem cells that are produced during this time. While unlikely, there are others who will have pregnancies that may have complications because of endometriosis (increased risk of placenta previa with deeply invasive disease), or become highly symptomatic in the post-partum period, and beyond, which of course can be very detrimental to both mother and child.

Pregnancy does not cure endometriosis. It is irresponsible and negligent for doctors to suggest pregnancy to a woman as a treatment for endometriosis, especially if she is in severe pain, as the pain will usually return after delivery. Having to take care of a newborn child while dealing with incapacitating pain only creates more problems for a woman suffering from endometriosis. A physician recommending pregnancy as treatment for endometriosis is a red flag as it is a sign of a basic misunderstanding of this disease by the physician and makes it likely the patient hasn’t been properly treated, or sometimes even diagnosed. As well, for a woman who does want to have children at that time, it can cause psychological trauma if she does not become pregnant after trying. All in all, it is time to take this centuries-old myth out of clinically-evidenced based medical practices.

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Thoughts on “Birth Control Your Own Adventure”

Vital Health Endometriosis Centers — Wed, 10 Jan 2018 21:33:49 +0000

Yesterday in the New York Times endometriosis patient Sindha Agha (not my patient) wrote a thought-provoking op-ed about her adventures in pharmaceutical hormone treatment for her endometriosis. What struck me the most about her accounts was the repetitive nature of hormones the care providers she saw offered. Over and over they offered her palliative treatments to her disease, with no thought to side effects or to an effective patient outcome. While Agha rightly was careful not to demonize birth control, what we are really talking about here is not birth control but treatment options for a disease than strike as many women as diabetes in their prime years, often rendering them with chronic, debilitating pain and organ dysfunction.

As a physician who treats endometriosis patients with wide excision surgical therapy, this makes me so sad. The fact that here we are more than twenty-five years after wide excision was pioneered, numerous clinical, peer-reviewed publications demonstrate it’s effectiveness, and the successes I’ve seen in my own practice of wide excision restoring women to their original vitality – yet ob-gyns are still just offering palliative care in the form of hormones, is dismaying to say the least. If hormones get the patient to the outcome she desires – functionality and return of quality of life, then they are an effective treatment. However, if they do not, we now know that delaying effective treatment to endometriosis patients in the form of palliative care can allow the disease to get more invasive and symptomatic. While there is currently no cure for endometriosis, wide excision surgery done by someone who can effectively identify the disease can be a highly effective therapy, and even curative. In addition, many women successfully manage their symptoms with alternative modalities from dietary changes to acupuncture. In short, health and wellness is not a pharmaceutical deficiency.

We now know that delaying effective treatment to endometriosis patients in the form of palliative care can allow the disease to get more invasive and symptomatic.

There are so many factors that play into the reasons for the lack of treatment options, including the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) refusing to update their outdated standards of care for endometriosis, to larger structural issues our entire healthcare system now grapples with. Over and over, women who have this disease get lost in the shuffle. Fortunately there are so many amazing clinical and patient activists who fight daily for changes in standards of care from Casey Berna to Shannon Cohn.

When I see my patients, the first thing I always do is just listen. This simple but powerful tool allows me as the physician a window into a woman’s experience. I’m hoping ob-gyn’s across the country, ACOG, and the larger medical system start to listen too.

Dr. Andrew Cook

Ready to start your healing journey? Request a free virtual consultation today.

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The Endometriosis Health & Diet Program: Available Now

Margaret Sterner — Thu, 01 Dec 2016 08:10:23 +0000

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Introducing :

The Endometriosis Health & Diet Program, co-authored by Dr. Andrew Cook and Danielle Cook.

This comprehensive, integrative program for treating endometriosis, and serves as a starting point for building an individualized program. It explains the medical side of endometriosis and how lifestyle factors may impact the disease — it answers the “why” of this condition, including ways to strengthen your body to optimize your health through detoxification and stress reduction. This program includes 100 delicious inflammation reducing recipes and useful tips to manage symptoms and potentially slow or halt endometriosis disease.

Now available for order on Amazon: The Endometriosis Health & Diet Program

Ready to start your healing journey? Request a free virtual consultation today.

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Dr Cook appears on The Doctors : 12-5-16

Margaret Sterner — Wed, 30 Nov 2016 22:46:07 +0000

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Please tune into your local CBS station to see Dr Cook on Monday, 12-5-16, on The Doctors TV Program. It will air in California at various times, depending on location. For those unable to watch the program at the airing time, there will be a post airing video available on our website, our Facebook page, and on The Doctors CBS website. San Francisco Bay Area residents can view on KRON-TV at 2pm, Los Angeles Area can view on KCAL-TV at 11am.

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RMC Endo Support Group Webinar with Dr Cook

Margaret Sterner — Mon, 14 Nov 2016 23:04:46 +0000

THANKS to Erin, Riverside Medical Clinic’s Endometriosis Support Group, for a great Webinar Hosting! Here is the video of this Webinar :

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