Abstract
Introduction and hypothesis
Many providers recommend concurrent estrogen therapy with pessary use to limit complications; however, limited data exist to support this practice. We hypothesized that vaginal estrogen supplementation decreases incidence of pessary-related complications and discontinuation.
Methods
We performed a retrospective cohort study of women who underwent a pessary fitting from 1 January 2007 through 1 September 2013 at one institution; participants were identified by billing code and were eligible if they were postmenopausal and had at least 3 months of pessary use and 6 months of follow-up. All tests were two sided, and P values < 0.05 were considered statistically significant.
Results
Data from 199 women were included; 134 used vaginal estrogen and 65 did not. Women who used vaginal estrogen had a longer median follow-up time (29.5 months) compared with women who did not (15.4 months) and were more likely to have at least one pessary check (98.5 % vs 86.2 %, P < 0.001). Those in the estrogen group were less likely to discontinue using their pessary (30.6 % vs 58.5 %, P < 0.001) and less likely to develop increased vaginal discharge than women who did not [hazard ratio (HR) 0.31, 95 % confidence interval (CI) 0.17–0.58]. Vaginal estrogen was not protective against erosions (HR 0.93, 95 % CI 0.54–1.6) or vaginal bleeding (HR 0.78, 95 % CI 0.36–1.7).
Conclusions
Women who used vaginal estrogen exhibited a higher incidence of continued pessary use and lower incidence of increased vaginal discharge than women who did not.
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Support from Harvard Catalyst | The Harvard Clinical and Translational Science Center (NIH Award #UL1 RR 025758) and financial contributions from Harvard University and its affiliated academic health care centers.
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Dessie, S.G., Armstrong, K., Modest, A.M. et al. Effect of vaginal estrogen on pessary use. Int Urogynecol J 27, 1423–1429 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00192-016-3000-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00192-016-3000-1