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About 33% of the 5.5 million women suffering from endometriosis in North America have bladder endometriosis. Usually only women who are in their reproductive years are prone to developing this chronic condition. In order for you to understand what bladder endometriosis is its best to know more about endometriosis itself.

Endometriosis is a gynecological condition in which the cells lining the uterus, called endometrium, grow in areas where they are not supposed to grow. The usual locations of endometriosis are the vagina, ovaries, fallopian tubes and other areas in the pelvic region.

However, these misplaced cells are also sometimes found outside the pelvic area, in areas like the bladder and rarely the lungs. When endometrium cells grow inside the bladder, the condition is called bladder endometriosis.

Symptoms of Endometriosis of the Bladder

Not all cases of endometriosis are reported because sometimes women do not associate any symptoms they have with the condition or they may be unaware they have endometriosis.

However, most women with bladder endometriosis complain of pain, which can either be mild or acute, in the pelvic area, especially during their monthly period. Most women only find out that they have this disease five to seven years after its onset because many believe the pains they are feeling are from premenstrual syndrome. A lot of women only begin to consider the seriousness of the situation when they experience other symptoms of the disease.

Other indications that you have bladder endometriosis are difficulty in urination and sometimes you may even have pus or blood in your urine, especially during menstruation. You may also experience painful intercourse, frequent urination, and soreness in the kidneys or bladder area, extreme fatigue and even fever. Bladder endometriosis is a serious illness because it can lead to complications such as damage to the kidneys and bladder.

Bladder endometriosis versus urinary tract infection and interstitial cystitis .

This illness is quite difficult to detect. If the symptoms are just painful urination, cause can be misdiagnosed as a urinary tract infection. However, you will realize that you don't have a urinary tract infection if antibiotics don't seem to work and symptoms continue to manifest. Moreover, laboratory results will show nonexistence of bacteria in your urine.

Another disease that has very similar symptoms to bladder endometriosis is interstitial cystitis. In fact, over 70 % of women suffering from bladder endometriosis are misdiagnosed and told they have interstitial cystitis.

Women suffering from interstitial cystitis have inflammation in the area between the lining of the bladder and the bladder muscle. That is why the sufferers of this disease also complain of pain in the pelvic region, blood or pus in the urine, difficulty in urination, pain during intercourse and frequent urination.

In order to determine if you're suffering from either bladder endometriosis or interstitial cystitis, you need to undergo cystoscopy, a procedure in which a doctor will insert a device called a cystoscope into your urethra. This will enable the doctor to view the bladder and get cell samples for biopsy.

One glaring difference between bladder endometriosis and interstitial cystitis is that only women suffer from bladder endometriosis, whereas men can also have interstitial cystitis, generally around 10% of IC suffers are men.

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