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Hi, I my name is Ashley, I am 21 years old and i just found out I have cervical cancer. Its only stage 0, carcinoma in situ. My gyno decided not to do anything, they said it will either go away on its own or, we will take care of it when it gets worse. I would like to know if they are right. Should i really wait to see if that will help it. I really hope somebody can help me..
Cancer Surgery Hysterectomy Miscarriage Cervical dysplasia Cryosurgery Cervical cancer Pain HPV Carcinoma in situ Folic acid Stress
hello, ash. i'm glad that you found this website! you've found a warm and supportive community.
i'm not a medical expert, but i've never heard of a watch and wait for your stage of dysplasia also called stage 0 cancer. here's the site on the american cancer society that indicates the standard treatments by stage:
http://www.cancer.org/docroot/CRI/content/CRI_2_4_4X_Treatment_Options_by_S tage_8.asp?rnav=cri
i would encourage you to see a gynecologic oncologist as they're the experts with cervical cancer/dysplasia.
sometimes mild dypslasia is just watched and it often can clear on its own, but you've evidently already had biopsies indicating that your dysplasia has progressed well past that point. Standard protocols all seem to indicate that CIS (carcinoma in situ) needs treatment, with options including leep and cone biopsy.
please see a gyn/oncologist! i'm glad to hear that you're questioning your current doctor's 'treatment' plan! you are your own best advocate.
Dear Ash:
I am very sorry that you have to deal with this problem but i just wanted to let you know that i have CINII and Carcinoma in-situ but my OBGYN wanted me to have a treatment for it right away. They do take months sometimes years to progress but you never know. I don't mean to scare you at all but flowershoplady is right about finding a GYN/Oncologist.
I did have a cone biopsy 5 weeks ago but i did not get a clear margins and there are some cells left. My GYN/Oncologist gave me 2 options now either go on "wait and Watch" but only for 6 weeks or have a hysterectomy and that is just because the cone biopsy did not remove all of the cells. Please, Please find yourself a GYN/Oncologist.
Best luck to you and i will keep you in my thoughts and prayers.
Ash,
Flowershoplady and Taylor are right. YOu need a 2nd opinion. See a gyno Oncologist, they are the experts. Now my gyno oncologist said that in the younger girls if they have low or high grade dysplasia they are doing more of the wait and see approach because chances are they will regress on their own. But if you have Carn-in situ...I would think they would want to remove that now.
I am 27 with CIN II and III. I went to a gyno oncologist and had a LEEP. I also like Taylor did not have clear margins. But I am glad that it got rid of most of the dysplasia I was dealing with.
Please ask your gyno for the referral and if they don't want to give you one. Just find a gyno oncologist on your own (I can help you if needed) and call them let them know whats going on and see if they will take you on as a patient. (I can also help you with that)
Good luck and stay in touch.
banana
Ashley,
I have been throught cervical cancer and you should find a gynocologic oncologist as soon as possible. The sooner they do something about it the better off you will be.
God Bless You
marie_eve
I want to thank all of you for your advice. I have talked to a lot of people about this but none of them were as warm and caring as all of you.
I am indeed going to get a 2nd opinion and it will be from a gyn/oncologist.
I am glad to know that you all dont think i am crazy for being so concerned.
Thank you all again.. I will keep in touch.
Thank you..
It is so nice to have people that are going through the same thing, or has gone through it.
thank you for saying that you would help me, you have no idea what that means to me.
Its just so frustrating you know.
Oh sweety,
We all know what your feeling because we have felt it in one way or another. Stay strong.
We are here to help!!
Banana
I was also just diagnosed with stage 0 last week. My dr scheduled me for cryosurgery in 2 weeks. I know how you feel. My lesions were first noticed 2 years ago as mild dysplasia. My dr then decided not to do anything about it. Well now here I am. We dont even know for sure if it is actually stage 0 or farther until my app. But you should totally get a second opinion.
Why are they doing cryo for stage 0? I would think a LEEP or Cone would make more sense. Cryo only gets the surface cells.
What was your dr's reasoning for the cryo? I am worried for you.
Hi Ash -
Sorry you are going do this road. I know it can be a little daunting and frustrating.
I was a CIN III pushing towards Stage 0 when I had my first adnormal Pap tests (two of them back-to-back). They did a wait and see approach, and retested me every 3 months. All along, never telling me I ever had HPV or what was causing this (Nine years ago they just didn't know). Although, my current doctor, who reviewed my medical records 8 years later pointed that I was at risk already and they should have done more for me. I never knew back then that the doctors thought I had precancer.
Anyway, things for me got worse over a 9 month period (stress and sick during winter) and after six months, my CIN III had become Stage 1 cervical cancer. I had a LEEP (which was like a tracelectomy now) and they removed the majority of my cervix.
The point I am making is not to panic you or thrust you into wanting surgery. My point is, make sure the wait and see viewpoint is your own or you at least share that opinion with your doctor. If you don't share their viewpoint, get a referral to another doctor. I didn't and I regret it!
As the women here have suggested, I would get a referral to a Gyn-Oncologist and get a second opinion. There are so many factors that can play into the progression of your diagnosis. A weakened immune or stress could push it along. BUT, you also could clear it on your own. Although, there are no guarantees!
My best advice would be to follow your gut. If you are not comfortable with the doctor's opinion, then move on and find another doctor.
I hope things go well for you and that the HPV clears itself.
Let us all know how it works out!
- PJ
I just wanted to let you know that i dont have hpv, they told me that must not be how i got it. My old gyno put me on a hight dosage of estrogen form my birth control pills and they said that might have been it.. I dont know..
ash, you may want to learn more about cervical cancer and hpv. in 99.7% of the cases, cervical cancer is caused by hpv, with the exceptions being a very rare cancer (clear cell, i think it's called). all squamous and adenocarcinoma cervical cancers are caused by hpv. and, similarly, cervical dysplasia has hpv as its cause. women who have been exposed to DES in uteru are in that exception group (and you're too young to have been in that exposed group of women). you may be currently testing hpv negative, but if you've got CIS now, then at one point, you had an active hpv infection. the hpv test only shows whether you currently have an hpv infection. it's great that you've cleared the hpv infection, but now you've got the dysplasia to deal with. i'm not familiar with a watch and wait with CIS, but i'm certainly not a medical expert, so i'm interested in hearing if the gyn/oncologist has the same recommendation for you, particularly since you're relatively young. do you have an appointment with a gynecologic oncologist yet?
Ash, I am glad to hear you are getting a second opinion. There should NOT be any waiting for CIS I. I had CIN III (A step below yours) and they treated it with a LEEP, yesterday actually. There was NO wait and see.
Also, do not be alarmed yet, Carcinoma in Situ is NOT cancer - yet. It may or may not turn into cancer, but since caught now, it needs to be treated as soon as possible.
And Flowershoplady is right, it is likely you had HPV at one point, and that's what's caused the dysplasia. But it's great news that it does not appear to be active in your body right now. that means your immune system is working.
As far as birth control pills go, a correlation has been made that women with dysplasia + have low levels of folic acid in their systems. The Birth control pill seems to deplete the folic acid in your system so be sure that you are taking at least a daily vitamin which should contain the daily recommended amount of folic acid that you need.
Good luck with everything, and if you're unsure of something your doctor tells you, keep asking questions until they give you answers in "civilian" terms. If you're still not sure, ask here, someone will answer quickly to point you in the right direction!
Hi Ash,
I'm sorry you're dealing with this. I went through Stage 1b2 CC in 2006. When I was diagnosed, my gyn said there was no trace of HPV. She said she was baffled - no HPV, I'm not a smoker, I didn't have sex at an early age, my mom didn't take a miscarriage-preventative drug that was popular in the 60s-70s.
Well after I completed my treatments with a gyn/onc, I asked him about it... and he said it most probably came from HPV.
HPV can be in your system for years and years before it wreaks any havoc. And it can appear, then hide again because your immune system knocks it down. So in my case, it seems that HPV progressed to cancer, then the HPV went into hiding, so to speak, but the cancer was full-blown.
Good luck with your treatments, and take care. Gerri
kingsley, what i find with your experience just amazes me that your gyn was baffled that you didn't show positive for hpv when your cancer was diagnosed. that means she/he, is so ignorant of any knowlege of hpv, that he/she doesn't know hpv can be active or dormant. scarey that doctors like that are allowed to practice with such lack of knowing the full circle of cervical cancer. that makes me think that any gyn should be given an hpv pop test. to see if they know all about hpv. these are the only people who are teaching (or not teaching) their patients about this disease. wow
so true, ariel. and from what some women have reported, some doctors have told them that 'their' cervical cancer wasn't caused by hpv, even though it was squamous or adenocarcinoma....and ALL of those two types of cervical cancers are caused by hpv. yep, very scary that these doctors have not kept themselves current with their medical knowledge and continue to practice medicine. and, it's not like this information is cutting edge...it's been known for many many years.
oh my god, this is stiffling to me. it so has to be addressed. is it then true that only oncology gynocologists have this knowledge, no, no, no, i'm hopeful that most gyns know what the facts are when it come to female health. ARE WE AT this web site more informed that our gyn's. o'boy i must digest this til tomorrow. pardon my sarcasm but really,
what do we expect those poor gyn drs. to deal with, newborn happy babies, yes of course, thats why they joined, not for cancer, thats for the oncologists, but when an oncologist is called, that call is usually for when HPV has ruled court over the patients life. HELLO .... to just gyn/obg drs........... if you only educate then perhaps us women won't need gyn/onc.
i wanted to be a veterinarian at 16, until my local vet said sure come in today...... the dog hit by the car..... he said "could you calm that dog" oh no???? i know you really just wanna get paid to cuddle puppies. and i smiled sheepishly and left,......... as all the other young girls had before me.
for the ob/gyn's we are not the babies to be cuddled we are the dogs hit by the car.
i'll address this mor tomorrow. thanks
Hello Ash! I'm so glad you found this web-site and am very sorry that you are going through this. That being said, I is my understanding that "In-situ" means that cancerous cells are confined to a certain layer of the tissue and have not spread yet. However, this group of nasty cells should be removed with either a leep procedure or a cone biopsy. I certainly don't feel like you should wait until it gets worse. You need to seek the opinion of an ob-gyn oncologist ASAP. I don't want to frighten you but you have to be pro-active right now. I just don't think that there is time to see if an already progressing lesion will get worse. To my knowlege, they don't just clear up on there own. I've never heard of that, and I've done a boatload of research since I was diagnosed with 1 B1 adenocarcioma last month. When I was diagnosed, my origingal pap results showed adenocarcinoma "in-situ" I'm worried for you and think you should see an ob-gyn ASAP. Please don't wait! We care about you!
Ash -
Again, I hate to be alarmist, but I was told three times, by three different doctors that I didn't have HPV and that I most likely developed cervical cancer because of exposure to secondhand smoke ( a lot of it too).
Anyway, after those three doctors, I found out that I more than likely had three false-negative tests and did in fact have HPV. Which was confirmed when I had my fourth test and subsequent diagnosis with cervical cancer.
With that said, 99.7 percent of all cervical cancer is caused by HPV. Your doctor needs to keep testing. In my case, I had a LEEP/Trach and the high grade tumor/lesion was cut out and removed all the HPV infection. If there was anything left, my body cleared it.
So, have your doctor test again at your next appointment. It is important to keep testing for HPV.
I have been cancer free and HPV free for 9 years now, but I still get tested to be sure isn't hanging out and dormant in my body. My doctor indicated that I probably cleared the infection, but it is better safe than sorry.
PJ
pj, aren't you concerned that your doctors either aren't informed about the cause of cervical cancer being hpv or that they aren't communicating this with you? you said that this information wasn't known 9 years ago....but it was known by some doctors, and it was known by the american cancer society, because i was being told this information by my doctors over 15 years ago and i still have my pamphlet from the american cancer society that they gave me about hpv and cervical cancer. certainly the understanding of hpv wasn't where it is today, and its being the cause of virtually all cervical cancers wasn't as definitive a fact, but the hpv and cervical cancer connection has been known for at least 15 to 20 years, and i would think that the gynecologic oncologists would certainly be the ones with the most up to date info. and of course, there was no 'hpv test' til recently, so the doctors would assume that hpv was or had been present when they saw cervical dysplasia and cervical cancer. perhaps second hand smoke is a risk factor, just as smoking is a risk factor. certainly we know that having hpv alone does not mean that a woman will develop cancer. i apologize if i'm belaboring the point....but i just don't understand how doctors who treat this disease could be so blind to its cause. is it because they're not keeping up with research studies and falling behind in their knowledge? it's scary that doctors who we trust, who we want to trust, may not be trustworthy. .....ok....getting off that pedestal......wiping off my cookie crumbs......
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