Learn what a typical Endometriosis prognosis is at Consumer Reports Health.

Endometriosis

What will happen to me?

If you've been diagnosed with endometriosis, the next step depends on how bad your symptoms are and whether you are trying to get pregnant.

Once you definitely know you have endometriosis, what happens depends on:

How old you are
How bad your symptoms are
Whether your main problem is pain or problems getting pregnant
Whether you want to get pregnant (now or in the future)
Whether you've had treatment for endometriosis before
The clinic you go to.

When doctors treat endometriosis, they are trying to:

Source:
Dawood MY.
Considerations in selecting appropriate medical therapy for endometriosis.
International Journal of Gynaecology and Obstetrics. 1993; 40: S29-S42.

Make you feel better, and relieve your pain
Make it easier for you to get pregnant if you want to
Control your endometriosis, so it doesn't get any worse
Protect the parts of your body that are important if you want to start a family in the future.

If you don't get treatment

If you don't get treatment, your endometriosis could:

Source:
Cooke ID, Thomas EJ.
The medical treatment of mild endometriosis.
Acta Obstetricia et Gynecologica Scandinavica. 1989; 150: 27-30.

Source:
Harrison RF, Barry-Kinsella C.
Efficacy of medroxyprogesterone treatment in infertile women with endometriosis: a prospective, randomized, placebo-controlled study.
Fertility and Sterility. 2000; 74: 24-30.

Get gradually worse, then get better when you go through menopause. This happens to about half of women with the disease.
Disappear on its own over the next year or so. This happens to about a third of women with mild endometriosis
Stay about the same, then get better when you go through menopause.

Endometriosis isn't cancer. But women who have endometriosis for many years have a higher risk of ovarian cancer than women who don't have endometriosis. It's hard to say how high the risk is as there is no good research on this.

Source:
Giudice LC, Kao LC.
Endometriosis.
Lancet. 2004; 364: 1789-1799.

⁴

Source:
Wells M.
Recent advances in endometriosis with emphasis on pathogenesis, molecular pathology and neoplastic transformation.
International Journal of Gynecologocal Pathology. 2004; 43: 316-320.

⁵

If your main problem is pain

Treatment should help, whatever kind of pain you have. Most women who have treatment such as birth control pills, medroxyprogesterone, or surgery to remove endometriosis get good relief from pain.

Unfortunately, the pain often comes back sooner or later. Up to half the women who have treatment get pain back within five years.

Source:
Rice VM.
Conventional medical therapies for endometriosis.
Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. 2002; 955: 343-406.

⁶ Doctors call this a relapse. We don't know how to predict who will get a relapse, and who won't. But if your pain comes back, you can have more treatment.

Source:
Vercellini P, De Giorgi O, Mosconi P, et al.
Cyproterone acetate versus a continuous monophasic oral contraceptive in the treatment of recurrent pelvic pain after conservative surgery for symptomatic endometriosis.
Fertility and Sterility. 2002; 77: 52-61.

⁷

Patches of endometriosis bleed when you have your period. So treatments that make you stop ovulating can make your endometriosis better. Birth control pills can help in this way. They also make your periods lighter, shorter or less frequent. And most women with endometriosis have less pain during pregnancy (when they don't have periods). But the pain often comes back again a few months after the birth.

Some women have surgery to remove their womb or ovaries. This often makes the pain go away and stay away. But this kind of surgery is a last resort. It brings on

menopause
When a woman stops having periods, it is called menopause. This usually happens around the age of 50.

menopause and you won't be able to have children after the operation. Women who choose this treatment are usually older, don't want any more children and have had painful endometriosis for a long time.

Source:
Olive DL, Schwartz LB.
Endometriosis.
New England Journal of Medicine. 1993; 328: 1759-1769.

⁸

Endometriosis gets better on its own once you reach menopause. This is because your body produces less

estrogen
Estrogen is the name given to three female sex hormones: oestradiol, oestrone and oestriol. Estrogen causes women's sexual development during puberty: it is needed to develop breasts, have periods and get pregnant. Estrogen is also thought to affect women's health in other ways. It may influence their mood, cholesterol levels and how their bones grow. Men have very low levels of estrogen in their bodies, but doctors aren't completely sure what it does. Estrogen is an important ingredient in most types of contraceptive pill and hormone replacement therapy.

estrogen, the

hormones
Hormones are chemicals that are made in certain parts of the body. They travel through the bloodstream and have an effect on other parts of the body. For example, the female sex hormone estrogen is made in a woman's ovaries. Estrogen has many different effects on a woman's body. It makes the breasts grow at puberty and helps control periods. It is also needed to get pregnant.

hormone that makes endometriosis grow. And you stop having periods, so the endometriosis shrinks.

If your main problem is not being able to get pregnant

It's less clear how well treatment works for women who have problems getting pregnant. It may depend on how bad the endometriosis is and also what treatment you have. One study showed that nearly 1 in 3 women with endometriosis were able to get pregnant after having surgery.

Source:
Jacobson TZ, Barlow DH, Garry R, et al.
Laparoscopic surgery for pelvic pain associated with endometriosis (Cochrane review).
In: The Cochrane Library. Wiley, Chichester, UK.

⁹

Many women with endometriosis have children without having had any treatment. We don't know how many because many cases of endometriosis are undetected. But in the study mentioned above, nearly 1 in 5 women who had been diagnosed with endometriosis went on to get pregnant without any treatment.

Source:
Jacobson TZ, Barlow DH, Garry R, et al.
Laparoscopic surgery for pelvic pain associated with endometriosis (Cochrane review).
In: The Cochrane Library. Wiley, Chichester, UK.

⁹

To find out more, see Treatments for women with endometriosis in our section on fertility problems.

Sources for the information on this page:

Dawood MY.Considerations in selecting appropriate medical therapy for endometriosis.International Journal of Gynaecology and Obstetrics. 1993; 40: S29-S42.

Cooke ID, Thomas EJ.The medical treatment of mild endometriosis.Acta Obstetricia et Gynecologica Scandinavica. 1989; 150: 27-30.

Harrison RF, Barry-Kinsella C.Efficacy of medroxyprogesterone treatment in infertile women with endometriosis: a prospective, randomized, placebo-controlled study.Fertility and Sterility. 2000; 74: 24-30.

Giudice LC, Kao LC.Endometriosis.Lancet. 2004; 364: 1789-1799.

Wells M.Recent advances in endometriosis with emphasis on pathogenesis, molecular pathology and neoplastic transformation.International Journal of Gynecologocal Pathology. 2004; 43: 316-320.

Rice VM.Conventional medical therapies for endometriosis.Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. 2002; 955: 343-406.

Vercellini P, De Giorgi O, Mosconi P, et al.Cyproterone acetate versus a continuous monophasic oral contraceptive in the treatment of recurrent pelvic pain after conservative surgery for symptomatic endometriosis.Fertility and Sterility. 2002; 77: 52-61.

Olive DL, Schwartz LB.Endometriosis.New England Journal of Medicine. 1993; 328: 1759-1769.

Jacobson TZ, Barlow DH, Garry R, et al.Laparoscopic surgery for pelvic pain associated with endometriosis (Cochrane review).In: The Cochrane Library. Wiley, Chichester, UK.

This information was last updated on Nov 06, 2008

This information is for educational use only, and is not a substitute for prompt professional medical advice. Readers should always consult a physician or other professional for advice and treatment.
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