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Menstruation
Menstruation is the onset of monthly menses (periods). Care needs to anticipate include possible heavy bleeding and recurrence of pain or irritability during periods. Management of menstrual problems includes treatments similar to those used by women without disabilities.
Your Team:
An interdisciplinary specialist who helps manage the medical, social and emotional challenges of complex and/or long-term care.
A doctor who specializes in female reproductive health.
A medical professional who practices general medicine.
Your child’s primary physician can review concerns about heavy menses or symptoms during periods. A complex care clinician and gynecologist can review menstrual suppression options if needed or desired.
What Your Child May Experience
Routine symptoms prior to and during menses, like cramps, can often be managed. Tracking and anticipating periods will help you build strategies for managing cramps and other symptoms. Your child’s primary physician can be helpful in this process.
An oral contraceptive pill (OCP), IUD or a birth control implant, which is a small rod inserted under the skin in the upper arm and typically replaced every four years, are sometimes used to manage the following:
- Monthly symptoms that are more significant
- Significant menstrual blood loss
- Bodily hygiene, which can be especially challenging with girls who require daily bladder catheterization (cathing)
- Seizures that sometimes worsen with menses
There are risks associated with nearly all treatments and processes to control menses, including deep vein thrombosis, or DVTs (blood clot in the leg or elsewhere in the body). However, most birth control methods are safe to use. Discuss these risks with your medical team.