Treatment

The goal of treatment is to reduce symptoms and improve quality of life.

If your doctor can pinpoint a specific cause, treatment will focus on that cause. However, if a cause can't be identified, treatment will focus on managing your pain and other symptoms. For many women, the optimal approach involves a combination of treatments.

Medications

Depending on the cause, your doctor may recommend a number of medications to treat your condition, such as:

• Pain relievers. Over-the-counter pain remedies, such as aspirin, ibuprofen (Advil, Motrin IB, others) or acetaminophen (Tylenol, others), may provide partial relief from your pelvic pain. Sometimes a prescription pain reliever may be necessary. Pain medication alone, however, rarely solves the problem of chronic pain.
• Hormone treatments. Some women find that the days when they have pelvic pain may coincide with a particular phase of their menstrual cycle and the hormonal changes that control ovulation and menstruation. When this is the case, birth control pills or other hormonal medications may help relieve pelvic pain.
• Antibiotics. If an infection is the source of your pain, your doctor may prescribe antibiotics.
• Antidepressants. Some types of antidepressants can be helpful for chronic pain. Tricyclic antidepressants, such as amitriptyline, nortriptyline (Pamelor) and others, seem to have pain-relieving as well as antidepressant effects. They may help improve chronic pelvic pain even in women who don't have depression.

Other therapies

Your doctor may recommend specific therapies or procedures as a part of your treatment for chronic pelvic pain. These may include:

• Physical therapy. Stretching exercises, massage and other relaxation techniques may improve your chronic pelvic pain. A physical therapist can assist you with these therapies and help you develop coping strategies for the pain. Sometimes physical therapists target specific points of pain using a medical instrument called transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS). TENS delivers electrical impulses to nearby nerve pathways. Physical therapists may also use a psychology technique called biofeedback, which helps you identify areas of tight muscles so that you can learn to relax those areas.
• Neurostimulation (spinal cord stimulation). This treatment involves implanting a device that blocks nerve pathways so that the pain signal can't reach the brain. It may be helpful, depending on the cause of your pelvic pain.
• Trigger point injections. If your doctor finds specific points where you feel pain, you may benefit from having a numbing medicine injected into those painful spots (trigger points). The medicine, usually a long-acting local anesthetic, can block pain and ease discomfort.
• Psychotherapy. If your pain could be intertwined with depression, sexual abuse, a personality disorder, a troubled marriage or a family crisis, you may find it helpful to talk with a psychologist or psychiatrist. There are different types of psychotherapy, such as cognitive behavioral therapy and biofeedback. Regardless of the underlying cause of your pain, psychotherapy can help you develop strategies for coping with the pain.

Surgery

To correct an underlying problem that causes chronic pelvic pain, your doctor may recommend a surgical procedure, such as:

• Laparoscopic surgery. If you have endometriosis, doctors can remove the adhesions or endometrial tissue using laparoscopic surgery. During laparoscopic surgery, your surgeon inserts a slender viewing instrument (laparoscope) through a small incision near your navel and inserts instruments to remove endometrial tissue through one or more additional small incisions.
• Hysterectomy. In rare complicated cases, your doctors may recommend removal of your uterus (hysterectomy), fallopian tubes (salpingectomy) or ovaries (oophorectomy). There are important health consequences to having this procedure. Your doctor will discuss the benefits and risks in detail before recommending this option.

Pain rehabilitation programs

You may need to try a combination of treatment approaches before you find what works best for you. If appropriate, you might consider entering a pain rehabilitation program.