STUDY-PLAN: an open study aimed at evaluating the results of a short term therapy (3 months) with Goserelin depot as a medical treatment of premenopausal dysfunctional uterine bleeding.
Patients: 60 premenopausal women (aged 36-50) with dysfunctional uterine bleeding, presenting simple endometrial hyperplasia.
Results: after the treatment, spontaneous menstrual bleeding recurred in 57/60 patients, while 3/60 (5%) patients remained amenorrheal during the whole period of follow-up, showing a postmenopausal hormonal pattern. In the first post-therapy menstrual cycle all the 57 patients had a bleeding score < 100; patients relapsing during the second, third and fourth cycle were respectively 2/54 (3.7%), 5/48 (10.7%) and 17/38 (44.7%). The fourth post-therapy cycle was delayed 6-9 months after the last injection of Goserelin. Both the mean blood loss and the mean duration of bleeding were significantly reduced in all post-therapy cycles. Eleven patients were anaemic before therapy (Hb < 12 g%); Goserelin treatment resulted in a normalization of the hematological parameters. At the end of treatment a small area of hyperplasia persisted in only 4/60 patients (6.7%). Localised or diffused hyperplasia were found respectively in 5/54 (9.3%) and in 1/54 patients (1.9%) at three months, and in 5/48 (10.4%) and 4/48 (8.3%) at a six-month follow-up. Side effects were infrequent.
Conclusions: the long symptom-free period and the low incidence of side effects indicates Goserelin depot as a valuable medical treatment for dysfunctional uterine bleeding.