Menorrhagia (synonyms: Bleeding abnormality – menstrual bleeding, prolonged (> 6 days); menstrual bleeding, prolonged (> 6 days); ICD-10-GM N92.0: Excessive or too frequent menstruation with regular menstrual cycle: menorrhagia) is a type disorder. It is present when bleeding is prolonged (> 6 days) and increased.
Bleeding abnormalities (bleeding or menstrual cycle disorders) are divided into rhythm disorders and type disorders.
Type disorders include:
- Hypermenorrhea – bleeding is too heavy; usually the affected person consumes more than five pads/tampons per day
- Hypomenorrhea – bleeding is too weak; the affected person consumes less than two pads per day
- Brachymenorrhea – bleeding duration < 3 days.
- Menorrhagia – bleeding is prolonged (> 7 days and < 14 days) and increased.
- Spotting – interstitial bleeding such as.
- Premenstrual spotting – spotting before actual menstruation.
- Postmenstrual spotting – spotting after the actual menstruation.
- Middle bleeding – spotting at the time of ovulation (ovulation).
- Metrorrhagia – bleeding outside the actual menstruation; it is usually prolonged and increased, a regular cycle is not recognizable
- Menometrorrhagia – prolonged and increased menstrual bleeding (bleeding duration > 14 days) with intermenstrual bleeding (eg, juvenile menometrorrhagia; due tohypogonadism (gonadal hypofunction), hyperprolactinemia (increase in blood prolactin levels); often in menopause)Caution: the term menometrorrhagia is often used synonymously with metrorrhagia in the clinic.
The prevalence (disease frequency) is 5-10% of all women between 15 and 45 years.
Course and prognosis: Due to the increased and prolonged bleeding, many women feel limited in the management of everyday life. For many of those affected, menorrhagia represents a psychological and social burden. Therapy is cause-related and, in addition to pharmacotherapy (drug treatment), surgical interventions such as removal of a polyp or, if previous measures are not sufficient, endometrial ablation (gold mesh method; ablation and/or destruction of the innermost layer of the endometrium (uterine lining), the so-called functionalis) or, taking family planning into account, hysterectomy (removal of the uterus) may become necessary. Menorrhagia, along with hypermenorrhea (see above), is the main indication for hysterectomy.
