Prevention Strategy of Intrauterine Adhesions: update and future perspective

Abstract

Intrauterine adhesions (IUAs) caused by endometrial injury have a serious impact on women's fertility and morbility and involves a wide range of patients. Although the first case of IUAs was published in 1984 by Heinrich Fritsch, a full description of Asherman syndrome was done by Joseph Asherman. IUAs lead to a lot of complications in women, as the partial or complete closure of the uterine cavity, which may result in symptoms including abnormal menstruation, pelvic pain, recurrent pregnancy loss, secondary infertility, and pregnancy complications. Hysteroscopy, which has relegated blind curettage, is currently considered the gold standard diagnostic and therapeutic approach also as for outpatients. However, an integrated approach, including preoperative, intraoperative and postoperative procedures is needed to improve the reproductive outcome of the complex syndrome. In the post-operative care, the patient can benefit from some therapeutic and prophylactic methods used alone or in combination with each other. In this review, authors discuss on the efficacy of traditional methods for the prevention of complications of IUAs after surgery, such as hormonal therapy, physical barriers, vasodilators and antibiotics, as well as novel strategies such as stem cell therapy and novel therapeutic agents.