Anemia and TAH vs. LAVH

I am scheduled to have TAH surgery a week from today and am feeling very apprehensive and wondering if I should go through with it. I have anemia with my ferritin level being 2 and my HCB 9.3 six weeks ago. I just had another blood draw yesterday and am waiting results. I am taking 300mg of phamacutical iron daily. I have had shortness of breath and my heart jumping around in my chest. Lately I'm noticing numbness in my hands, arms, feet and legs. I am 52 and my periods stopped in the spring for a few months, then returned heavy again until last month, I missed. I also have abnormal pap smears off and on over the years, the last one in May, and have had 2 D&C's in the last 2 years. I have endometriosis and a couple of large fibroids with a uteris the size of a 3 month pregancy. I am fed up and ask my doctor to do the hysterectomy. My question is has anyone else had surgery with blood levels like mine? Did you have to have a blood transfusion? Would having a LAVH be possible with the fibroids and enlarged uteris?

Hi Shepick,

I can't answer the anemia question but on the LAVH question....you might talk it over with your Dr. or possibly reschedule surgery and get a 2nd opinion if you are having doubts on the type of hyst.

I got 2 opinions myself. My 1st Dr. wanted to do a TAH due to the size of my fibroids. My 2nd Dr. suggested a LSH, after I did (3) months of lupron shots to shrink my fibroids enough for the less invasive hyst.

You might ask your Dr. about lupron. It is not for everyone since it causes temporary chemcial menopause. Lupron helps to stop the production of estrogen and in turn it can stop periods temporarily, which helps the blood count go up. In my case, it helped my fibroids shrink and it stopped my periods for the 3 months before my surgery.

Best wishes,

Mary

My HB count was 10.8 when I had my surgery. I did bleed internally after the surgery although not during and it was nothing to do with my anemia. After the bleed my HB was down to 5.2 and then I had 4 units of blood transfused. Following that my HB was 9.8. Last week it was up to 11.7 With no more periods I may end up with a good HB count for the first time in years.

Don't panic. If you need blood you will get it. Explain your concerns to your Dr but I can't imagine your anemia will influence the type of procedure you have as all of them should result in minimal blood loss. They usually choose to do the least intrusive surgey they can depending on your circumstances. I couldn't have laparascopic or vaginal hyst becasue of the size of my uterus and becasue they were concerned that my huge fibroid may be cancerous. Luckily it wasn't but they felt that it was too risky as laparascopic would also have taken too long with the fibroid being so big. I didnt bleed from the abdominal incision so I could have had the problem whatever procedure I had.