Essure birth control - lawsuits and many problems

Essure came out in 2002  and was touted as a permanent birth control.  What it is, is a coil placed in each fallopian tube (the passageway to the uterus).

By 2011, complaints were pouring in and an article on CNA in 2016, described some rather horrific side effects.

"Perforated organs, metal coils lodged in the colon, fetal disfigurement due to nickel poisoning, Chronic pain, bouts of depression and suicidal thoughts - it's the stuff nightmares are made of. But these are real symptoms...observed with ...a device, Essure."
(from CNA article, Dec 2015)

The Doctor who invented it, has stopped doing it and a Facebook group to list complaints has grown to 24,000 members.

The listed side effects include "mild to moderate pain and/or cramping, vaginal bleeding and pelvic or back discomfort for a few days. Some women experienced nausia and/or vomiting. In rare instances, an Essure insert may be expelled from the body."

An administrator for the Essure Problems group, said the women in the group have experienced these problems to the extreme.

And should a woman want the insert removed, might have experienced device migration with the Essure coil being embedded in the colon or somewhere in the pelvis.  Essure coils in the colon can cause a blockage.

One woman experienced bankrupcy since the removal of the Essure was not covered by insurance. Worse yet, apparently the only safe and sure way to remove the Essure coils is a hysterectomy.

There is a lot more on this device - but suffice it to say it seems like a very bad idea.  I did a Google search and the first hits to come up were all lawsuits by unhappy Essure people - so you know the attorneys are making bucks.

More Bad news about birth control meds and more

update on pills and more

Haven't updated in a while so here is a catch up....

 New birth control device has nasty side effects and is not any more effective than the BC pill (about 60%), if that.  Natural Family Planning... 95% effective and 100% safe - any reason to not switch?  Essure is an implanted device in the uterus but the small coils have been found in several other places in the body like embedded in the colon.  Other side effects women have experienced with Essure, are include perforated organs, fetal disfigurement due to nickel poisoning, chronic pain, exhaustion.

S/ex change operations -  Johns Hopkins is still not doing "gender reassignment" surgery because they found in their studies, a greatly increased rate of suicide in post ops (suicide rate in post ops of gender reassignment surgery is 20% higher than in the general population).

Weight Loss - And in case you were thinking of using "Garcinia Cambogia" (advocated on TV) as a weight loss supplement, you might want to reconsider it - apparently recent studies found it neither safe nor effective.

Updated informed consent info on birth control meds

 Check this before you decide to take birth control meds!

Before you decide to take the Birth Control pill, you might want to view the following updated information about the risks. And even with all these risks, birth control meds are only 60% effective. Whereas Natural Family Planning is 98% effective and 100% safe. (Billings Ovulation)

1. Estrogen/progestin combination in birth control and HRT, was declared a class one carcinogen by the World Health Organization in 2005. All class 1 carcinogens have been found to cause cancer in both lab and human studies.


2. There are 12,000 lawsuits pending because of serious complications (and death) from the birth control medication, "Yaz", a 4th generation progestin (drospirenone) which has been linked to blood clots, gall bladder disease, stroke, heart attack and death in young women (ref: www.lawyersandsettlements.com)


3. With even low dose birth control, the risk of developing CVD (hypertension and stroke) is 1.9 times greater than those not taking the medication. One study found the risk of thrombosis to be 5 times greater in birth control medication consumers than in non birth control consumers. ref: (BMJ 2009;339:b2921) (British Medical Journal)


4. The birth control patch delivery system causes similar risks to the pill - Ortho McNeil the manufacturer of the patch has paid out so far, 68.7 million to settle more than 4000 lawsuits. Ortho-Evra (the patch) has also been blamed for 20 deaths.
   
   
5. And finally, "Plan B" the so called "emergency contraceptive" delivers a dosage of birth control meds which is 10 times higher, the equivalent of a month's worth of low dose birth control meds. (Polycarp Institute)

And all of this in addition to an up to 25% break through ovulation rate which will abort the embryo because it may not implant in the uterus.  Billings Ovulation (Natural Family Planning) is so easy to learn that it's taught to women in 3rd world countries and other than abstaining a few days a month, there are no pills to remember etc... it's also a mutual choice between you and your spouse which seems more the way it should be ---and safe for you and your future progeny!  Sounds like a win-win to me!

The hidden risks of hormonal birth control

The article, link below, below, was written by a nurse who referenced data from the Gullmacher Institute of Planned Parenthood and other scientific sources....

Is hormonal birth control safe?

First of all,read the risks - a 40% greater risk of heart attack, stroke and thrombosis  - that's on the prescribing info, that no one reads!

Secondly, the elephant in the room is that the hormones, all of them, greatly raise the risk for cancer of all kinds especially uterine and breast cancer.  Unless you listen to Dr Oz who now says the birth control meds are cancer protective!  He also advocates gastric bypass, a procedure which has been dropped by many surgeons due to the risks!

Consider the following from scientific sources :

(1)     Since 1975 there has been a 400% increase in in situ breast cancer among pre-menopausal women under 50 years old. This mirrors the increased use of birth control over these same years. In situ is a medical term which means “at the location.”

(2) >     A Mayo Clinic study confirms that any young girl or woman who is on hormonal birth control for 4 years prior to their first full term pregnancy increases their breast cancer risk by 52%.

(3)   Women who use hormonal birth control for more than 5 years are four times more likely to develop cervical cancer.

 (4)     The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), a research arm of the World Health Organization, classifies all forms of hormonal contraception as a Group 1 carcinogen. This group of cancer causing agents also includes cigarettes and asbestos.

(5) Why is it that the FDA can require cigarette manufacturers to place warning labels and  real life photos of corpses on cigarette packages to warn consumers of the health dangers yet they, in turn, take an equally harmful substance (hormonal birth control) and force companies to give it away free to young girls without parental consent and woman of all ages?   For high school boys and men to take steroid drugs, it is a crime. Whereas girls and women taking steroid drugs (i.e. hormonal birth control) are now treated as if they are taking a sacred, life preserving vitamin that women cannot live without.

(6)  In October 2010 the NY Times carried an article about Hormone Replacement Therapy drugs. It quoted the America Medical Association (AMA) as warning women that these post-menopausal drugs which were originally marketed as keeping a women “young and sexy” were discovered instead to be more likely to cause advanced and deadly breast cancer.

(7) It stopped short of making one other startling revelation: The only difference between hormone replacement therapy drugs which cause deadly breast cancer and the hormonal birth control drugs (now mandated by the Obama administration) is that the birth control drugs are six times the dosage---and are the very same drug! 

Does birth control cut down the number of abortions?

Nope, not according to statistics... Planned Parenthood reports that 60% of the abortions they sell are due to failed birth control... The pill is only 60-70% effective!

Is the IUD any safer? 

According to this article, besides irritating the womb and causing a fertilized egg to abort, the IUD releases birth control hormones into the body.

Finally what about the so called morning after pill?

Well, it's 6 times the dosage of regular birth control medication.  So do the math!

The only difference between hormone replacement therapy drugs which cause deadly breast cancer and the hormonal birth control drugs ... is that the birth control drugs are six times the dosage---and are the very same drug! 

If you are a medical provider and have prescribed these medications or devices for someone who trusts you and they get a heart attack or stroke or cancer, are they going to thank you then?

This nurse asks why when we warn about cigarettes, we do not warn about the cancer risks of hormonal birth control medication...a question I've often asked also..

"Any way you name it, these hormone drugs dispense poison into a woman’s body."

Click here to read article - note article includes links to scientific sources!

New Study finds high cancer risk with low dose birth control/hormone replacement

Low Dose Birth Control Hormones are given for birth control and also for hormone replacement therapy (HRT). And the cancer risk with pharmaceutical estrogen first popped up in the 1930's when rats given the drug, all came down with breast cancer, both males and females. In the 1960's this study was repeated with the same results, but funded by Planned Parenthood which saw a gold mine in selling a medication for contraception, research pushed on and in the mid 1960's, the "birth control pill" became available, touted as safe and effective.

Epidemiological studies which are notoriously inaccurate but because of the large numbers involved, convincing to the public (and medical providers also) suggested that giving menopausal women estrogen (and later on, low dose birth control including estrogen and progestin) would relieve their hot flashes and other symptoms associated with menopause and even protect them from heart attacks.

But even after these studies, nursing magazines referred to the "estrogen - breast cancer risk". The Merck Manual also listed these medications as significantly raising the risk for heart attack, stroke and thrombosis (40% higher risk in those taking the hormones). But the general public never heard about these risks and the large epidemiological studies which suggested that this medication was "heart protective" were convincing.

In the year, 2000, 9 million women were on premarin for menopause.

Meanwhile, the incidence of breast cancer went from a low percentage in the 1950's to occurring in 1 in 8 women by 2000 (80,000 women die yearly in the USA, from breast cancer).

In the early 2000's, 2 NIH double blind studies had to be stopped mid-term because those on estrogen alone or low dose birth control - estrogen and progestin, were getting too many heart attacks, strokes and cancer. And pharmaceutical estrogen was put on the FDA list of cancer causing chemicals in 2005.

Recently a new study, an 11 year point analysis of the Women's Initiative Study Data, suggested that low dose birth control given for Menopause and Hormone Replacement significantly raises the risk of cancer.

The women taking both estrogen and progestin were found to have a much greater chance of dying from lung cancer or breast cancer (for example, women on HRT had a 70 percent greater chance of dying of lung cancer than those who never took the hormones).

The study was reported on in the AMA's Journal. Rowan Chlebowski, of the Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, who led the analysis,told the press:

"Women taking estrogen plus progestin are at greater risk from dying from the two leading causes of cancer death in women."

In 2002, there were 110 million prescriptions filed for low dose birth control. By 2005 after both NIH studies had to be halted, prescriptions "plummeted" to 40 million. And the incidence of breast cancer also dropped somewhat.

However, today, millions of women still take the hormones as birth control and hormone replacement therapy. In my acquaintance, I've seen a 17 year old have a stroke (she was on hormones for birth control - it paralyzed her partially) and recently, a woman in her 50's with no other risk factors, had a major stroke paralyzing her totally on one side. This woman was likely on hormone replacement therapy.

It is hoped that with the new analysis, the public will finally consider not taking these hormones.

When my husband and I got married in 1966, the "pill" was a new thing. Everyone asked me enthusiastically if I was planning to take the pill. "No," I told them, "That's a system which is too sensitive and I have a hunch that dumping amounts of pharmaceutical hormones into my body would not be a healthy thing!" I never did take birth control medication - but had no idea how unhealthy and risky those hormones would turn out to be.

NOTE: Natural Progesterone Cream (like "Progesta-Care") is a nice alternative for menopause which cuts the symptoms but does not put the woman at risk. See "WHAT YOUR DOCTOR MIGHT NOT TELL YOU ABOUT MENOPAUSE" by Dr John Lee, MD. (No, I do not sell this but this is what I used to get me smoothly through menopause and also, to avoid a hysterectomy.)