Brooke Sears spent over two years seeking answers for her debilitating symptoms, only to face frustration and dismissal from healthcare providers. She fought hard to secure a diagnosis of polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS). Her story, despite the fact that this under-diagnosed condition, endometriosis, affects an estimated one in ten women across North America, was not an uncommon one. Her experience highlights a troubling pattern in women’s reproductive health, where countless patients do not feel listened to or recognized.
PCOS is a complex, underdiagnosed hormonal disorder that affects reproductive-aged people and can cause devastating physical and mental comorbidities. Research indicates that women with PCOS are three to six times more likely to develop eating disorders if their concerns are ignored. Many medical providers are not attuned to the complexities around PCOS. This ignorance results in a lack of effective treatment options for patients, thus continuing to worsen their condition.
The Journey of Brooke Sears
Brooke Sears’s challenges started with a whole host of unexplained symptoms that physically and emotionally drained and confused her. “I just didn’t get, I wasn’t getting the concept of why I was just not succeeding at this,” she said about her inability to find support. After hundreds of appointments with physicians who could not identify her illness, she became even more marginalized.
“I’m really just being brushed aside as not being important enough to think about these things,” she said. As a result, fighting an undiagnosed condition was an immense emotional burden on her. When she finally got her official diagnosis in writing, she was overcome with horror. “I was personally literally devastated, shocked, didn’t even know what to do,” she remembered.
Sears’ experience is unfortunately the direction that many women pursuing a PCOS diagnosis are facing. Most others experience the same obstacles, and when untreated these issues can cause lasting ramifications. Experts like Julie Kane emphasize that without proper care, PCOS patients can develop serious health issues such as type 2 diabetes and fatty liver disease.
“A lot of these PCOS patients … without treatment, they end up with type 2 diabetes — all kinds of other issues, (like) fatty liver disease, things like that,” – Julie Kane
The Lack of Awareness and Education
We as Tanya Zboril, a committed health care worker, further dispel a dangerous myth. She explains that the gap in education around women’s reproductive health is largely to blame for the shortage of accurate PCOS diagnoses. In the same way, she argues that too many practitioners are willing to ignore the issue’s many complexities. As a consequence, patients continue to be uninformed about superior treatment choices.
“Nova Scotia is not exactly the birthplace of a cutting-edge health-care delivery system,” Zboril said, highlighting the systemic barriers that patients face. She advocates for a multifaceted approach for all who fight the battle of PCOS. This condition can’t be addressed with a broad-brush approach.
Zboril describes how physicians will frequently prescribe different birth control methods to control the symptoms of PCOS. Furthermore, due to their synthetic nature, these methods fail to address the underlying cause of the condition. These approaches can address some symptoms but treat them reactively without offering the comprehensive care needed to build sustainable health from within.
“They are commonly prescribed because they are effective at stopping the reproductive cycle and improving symptoms,” – Tanya Zboril
Exploring Treatment Options
One alternative treatment gaining traction is bioidentical progesterone, which has shown promise in alleviating symptoms for some women with PCOS. Julie Kane has been an effective advocate for this approach, arguing that most patients show significant improvement within a matter of days after starting progesterone therapy.
“And the progesterone that I prescribe is bioidentical, meaning that when you take it, your level go up,” explained Kane. Bioidentical progesterone has important advantages over standard hormonal treatments. This results in measurable improvements in laboratory values, providing patients with tangible results that shed light on their hormonal equilibrium.
Kane asserts that with the increasing use of traditional birth control and IUDs, similar positive outcomes would not be seen compared to the progesterone treatment. Your levels of progesterone go up in your lab work. With BC and IUDs, I’ve seen no change. So, you’re not actually reaping that benefit,” she observed.
This nuanced understanding of hormone therapy highlights the need for personalized, patient-centered care for those with PCOS. Effective treatment requires practitioners to have a deep understanding of their patients’ symptoms, facilitating personalized health strategies that address specific needs.
“It’s similar to diabetes in that there are fluctuations in a person’s blood sugar levels. And this is very hard to diagnose with labs,” – Julie Kane
