Risk of Fibroids in African American Women is Higher

Risk of Fibroids in African American Women
*SNIP*
That said, as recently as 2000, the National Institute for Environmental Health Science (NIEH), a division of the National Institutes of Health, stated that: “Based on hysterectomy statistics, African-American women appear to be a three- to nine-fold higher risk than white women, although it is not known if this disparity reflects a true difference in incidence or prevalence of uterine fibroids or, instead, is due to differences in diagnosis and treatment.”

In other words, in the past there has been concern within the black community that African American women with fibroids receive the lion’s share of the hysterectomies. Instead of having any taint of racism, however, the NIEH concluded that “real differences in uterine fibroid risk between blacks and whites” exist.

As one study the NIEH and the Office of Research on Minority Health initiated among 35 to 49 year old members of a large pre-paid health plan in Washington, D.C. showed, 73 percent of the black women had uterine fibroids compared to 48 percent of the white women. Consequently the researchers assumed that higher numbers of hysterectomies in African American women simply reflected higher incidences of fibroids in that population grouping.
Also, fibroids tend to occur at earlier ages and grow to larger sizes in black women than they do in non-black women. Clearly, just as some Jewish women have genetic predispositions to breast and ovarian cancers, significant numbers of African American women are at higher risk for uterine fibroids and their often disabling symptoms.

Uterine Fibroid Study
While fibroids are benign and not life endangering like female cancers of the breasts and ovaries, this uterine tumors can put a real damper on quality of life, as well as child bearing plans. To investigate this dynamic, the NIEH sponsored the Uterine Fibroid Study (UFS) between 1995 and 1999, with follow-ups into the new millennium.

Said UFS study manager, Ms. Glenn Heartwell, M.P.H., “During the years we were conducting the baseline Uterine Fibroid Study, I was coping with the pain and bleeding from fibroids that were growing inside my own body. I searched for causes and answers from physicians and researchers, but there were no answers. Though the therapy I chose helped, I still had questions. As the data from the study interview came in, I was encouraged that somewhere in our collective wisdom and experience we may find out what causes fibroids.”

Heartwell penned her “special appeal” above to encourage all 1,229 women who participated in the initial study to follow through with 30 minute telephone interviews designed to track women through menopause, at which time fibroids that are estrogen-dependent, begin to shrink in size – as well as lose their ability to cause distressing symptoms.

Other efforts on the national fibroid scene continue to be aimed at research focused on black women. The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) under the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reported that 7 percent of white women and as high as 20 percent of black women have hysterectomies for fibroids by the time they reach age 45. As to why more black women don’t choose myomectomy that saves the uterus or a minimally-invasive procedure, the AHRQ concluded that there is simply not enough information.
*SNIP*

Comments

Very informative. Fortunately this has not been an issue for me but I am aware that a number of women, including my friends suffer from it. Five of them, 4 Black, and 1 white all had surgery while two of them had partial hysterectomies. The fibroids that were so large and numerous that they made their abdomens protrude enough to give the appearance of someone 3 months pregnant.

I've heard that one reason why black women don't choose myomectomy is due to their doctors failing to give them the information and/or being pushed into getting the hysterectomy. Luckily the two already had children but that's not always the case.
 

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