I decided for this week's pathology blog to write about a case which I actually saw while I was working. A patient came to the ER complaining of severe abdominal pain. A pelvic ultrasound was performed and it was determined that she had a 12 cm ovarian cyst. A CT was the performed to take a closer look. The image on the left is a sagittal reformatted image of this patient's exam. The report read that this was too large to be a simple cyst and was most likely a neoplasm. The patient had a complete hysterectomy the next day and that's all I know about this particular case.
Ovarian cysts are most often tiny fluid collections that form in or on the outside of the ovaries in many women. From what I have learned from the Radiologists at the hospital where I work, they are actually quite common. Most are small and don't cause any symptoms or harm to the women who have them. For those that do experience symptoms they usually include abdominal pain, abnormal vaginal bleeding, pain during intercourse, or weight gain. The most common type of ovarian cyst is a functional cyst which often forms while a woman is having her period.
Ovarian cysts most often go unnoticed until they rupture causing severe abdominal/pelvic pain, fever, nausea, and vomiting. Usually a pain medication is prescribed to help with this until symptoms go away.
The most common diagnostic tool for diagnosing ovarian cysts is a pelvic ultrasound. But like the patient I mentioned earlier, CT or MRI can be useful in diagnosing more large and complex cysts.
Most ovarian cysts go away on their own and no treatment is needed. For others, surgery is necessary to remove the cysts. There is no way to prevent an ovarian cyst and some women are unfortunately just more likely to get them than others.
The image used in this blog is from OMHS and my information was found on womenshealth.gov
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