What is a chocolate cyst? Does it have something to do with chocolate? Are you eating too much chocolate? Sorry, chocolate cysts have nothing to do with chocolate! But it has something to do with female fertility.
What is a chocolate cyst?
Although the name of ovarian chocolate cyst may sound sweet, it is actually a special kind of endometriosis, which can bring a big crisis to women. The normal endometrium should grow in the uterine cavity, thicken continuously under the influence of hormones, and fall off without the implantation of a fertilized egg, resulting in menstruation.
If these sloughed pieces pass through the fallopian tubes and into the pelvis, they can form cysts on the surface of the ovary or elsewhere in the pelvis, which then fall off every month along with menstruation. If the lesion occurs in the ovary, the monthly local bleeding will cause the ovary to enlarge, forming an old hematopoietic cyst with a thick texture and a dark color, like chocolate.
Why do chocolate cysts reduce female fertility?
1. Chocolate cysts lead to stretching, thinning and fibrosis of the ovarian cortex around the cyst, resulting in atresia and apoptosis of follicles in the early stage.
2. Chocolate cysts reduce the density of follicles in the ovary, reduce the number of antral follicles, and reduce fertility.
3. Chocolate cysts cause an inflammatory reaction that affects the nearby ovarian cortex, and the longer it lasts, the more severe it becomes.
There are also a large number of endometriosis patients with infertility, therefore, early detection and early treatment are necessary.
Most patients have pelvic pain of varying degrees, and the pain is often secondary and progressive, but some ovarian chocolate cysts have no symptoms of dysmenorrhea. There are also patients with infertility, and there may be pelvic nodules and masses. Endometriosis that affects specific organs is often accompanied by other symptoms.
1. Dysmenorrhea
Dysmenorrhea is one of the symptoms of chocolate cysts. Women with ovarian chocolate cysts, which start before menstruation or even in the second half of the cycle, will find that they last throughout the menstrual period and disappear a few days after menstruation.
When menstruation arrives, the symptoms of dysmenorrhea will become more obvious, and the pain area is mostly in the middle of the lower abdomen, and the lesion area extends to the uterus and rectum.
2. Irregular menstruation
If a chocolate cyst affects ovarian function, it can also cause irregular menstruation. Usually there will be heavy menstrual flow, long menstrual duration and so on.
3. Sexual pain
Some patients with endometriosis have stomach pains during sex. This is because the chocolate cyst acts on the ovaries and causes the uterine muscles to contract, so the stomach will feel obvious pain, especially in the uterus.