Pelvic Inflammatory Disease, or PID is an infectious disease that affects millions women and girls each year. Although usually
surprisingly esay to treat, it can be hard to diagnose, and can lead to many long-term and troublesome complications. And, while PID is often a sexually transmitted disease (STD), in may cases it is caused by
bacteria that are not necessarily associated with sexual activity. Therefore, all women should understand the signs and symptoms of this illness, the diagnostic and treatment options available, the long-term effects of PID, and methods of prevention.
Simply put, PID is a specific set of symptoms caused bya an
infection of the upper parts of the female genital organs (uterus, tubes, or ovaries). One or more bacteria travels from the vagina into and through the cervix then into the uterus. The infection may ''set up shop'' in the uterus, or, more likely, continue up into the fallopian tubes through the tiny openings at the top of the uterus that lead to the tubes. The tubes are axtremely fragile and aare easily damaged by bacterial infection. If the infections ends at the tubes, we call this ''salpingitis'' which is another common term for PID. If the infection spreads through the tubes and into the abdominal cavity, it is often called peritonitis. Generally, the bacteria that cause PID can infect and inflame any or all of the organs they bear the brunt of the infection and are the organs most commonly damaged.
PID can come from any number of common bacteria. The sexually transmitted organisms chlamydia and gonorrhea are the most common ''bugs'' found in the tubes of women affected with PID. However, PID is not necessarily a veneral disease, as other, non-sexual bacteria, have been isolated in the tubes of women with this disease. For example, in unusual cases surgical procedures involving the uterus can lead to PID from the normal bacteria found in every woman''s vagina. In other cases, chlamydia, gonorrhea, and yhe bacteria found normally in the vagina may work hand-in-hand to cause the infection. Since we can work only determine the excact bacteria by culturing the fallopian tubes, a difficult and complicated precess, we treat PID by giving antibiotics that will kill all the possible bacteria that can cause the illness.