Vaginal Bleeding

• Vaginal Bleeding Overview
• Vaginal Bleeding Causes
• Vaginal Bleeding Symptoms
• When to Seek Medical Care
• Exams and Tests
• Vaginal Bleeding Treatment
• Self-Care at Home
• Medical Treatment
• Surgery
• Next Steps
• Follow-up
• Outlook
• For More Information
• Web Links
• Synonyms and Keywords
• Authors and Editors

Vaginal Bleeding Overview

Unexpected bleeding is always a concern for any woman at any stage of life. Anything other than a normal menstrual period and even an abnormally heavy period can be great cause for alarm.

It's important to understand exactly what is causing the bleeding and where it's coming from (uterus, vagina, or some other organ or tissue) and to make decisions about how to control or stop the bleeding.

• A woman's normal menstrual cycle involves a complex series of hormonal events. Various parts of your body coordinate with one another as an egg is released from an ovary. Either the egg is fertilized by a sperm and implants in the uterus, or the lining of your uterus is shed each month as your menstrual period. This shedding causes normal menstrual bleeding.

• A normal menstrual cycle is 28 days plus or minus 7 days.
  
  
• You may have your period for 2-7 days and have a normal volume of blood and fluid loss of about 5 tablespoons. This is about 8 or fewer soaked pads per day with usually no more than 2 heavy days.

• When bleeding is not caused by your menstrual cycle, it is called abnormal or dysfunctional uterine bleeding. This is the most common cause of abnormal vaginal bleeding during a woman's childbearing years. Up to 10% of women may experience excessive bleeding at one time or another. African American women tend to have more episodes.

• When the complex hormonal process that creates your menstrual period loses coordination and the hormones estrogen and progesterone are out of balance, your body overproduces uterine blood flow. Thus, you may experience excessive vaginal bleeding. This bleeding is related to irregularities of your menstrual cycle without any evidence of disease.
  
  
• The diagnosis of dysfunctional uterine bleeding is a diagnosis of exclusion, which means that all other causes for the bleeding (including trauma, lesions, or diseases) have been looked for and determined not to be the cause of the bleeding.
  
  
• Depending on your age, there are different reasons for you to have dysfunctional uterine bleeding.

• Certain diseases of the female genital tract may cause bleeding.

• You may have experienced trauma that can cause bleeding.