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Tubal removal for birth control

[00:00:00] I wanted us to talk quickly about removing your tubes as a form of birth control, and also because it decreases the risk of ovarian cancer. Many people are having C-sections for various reasons, either planned or unplanned. It's something to consider if you're going to have a C-section, whether or not you are done having babies. 

Meaning if you are sure that 1000% you do not ever want to get pregnant again, then when you have your C-section, you can certainly talk to your doctor ideally ahead of time. So this is not a last minute game day decision, but ahead of time about whether or. , you wanna have your tubes removed. As you know, the tubes are where the egg and the sperm meat create the embryo and then it goes back into the uterus tube burrow and create your pregnancy. 

So removing your tubes is actually a really good form of birth control. It is 99.7% effective. That's actually data from the old way. We used to do it where we just removed a little portion of the tube. So the truth is maybe now it's even more effective, but we haven't recalibrated that data. So 99.7%, which is pretty much as good.[00:01:00]  

Now, what are the upsides? The upsides are a, if you're already having a C-section, your doctors are looking at your tubes. It adds three to seven minutes. Theoretically it adds a slight increased risk of bleeding, but that's really unlikely and it's. As permanent birth control as you can get short of a vasectomy. 

Why should you not? Instead make your partner get a vasectomy. Listen, I'm all four of the partners doing something, but the truth is if you're having a C-section anyway, it's worth you considering having your tubes removed. The other upside is that data in the last decade has shown us that ovarian cancer actually starts in the fallopian tube. 

So removing your tube significantly decreases the risk of ovarian cancer for all women, particularly women with a family history of ovarian cancer or breast. because we know that that can also be risk factors for it. So it's something that I really think is valuable to discuss really with every patient. 

The truth is that we don't talk about it with every patient because it's a longer discussion. And the fact is we kind of make assumptions that if someone is young or having their first baby, even if they're having a C-section, that they probably don't [00:02:00] want to be done, and that's incorrect. That is our bias. 

So if you think that you are absolutely done having a. Please consider it. The reason I say 1000% instead of a hundred percent is you don't wanna do something permanent and then consider in the future that you might change your mind. Now, part of me hates saying that because it's a very paternalistic attitude. 

You know yourself, you know your body. If you're sure you're done, you are done. But I think it bears. Reason that you should really, really take this seriously because it is again, a permanent, irreversible surgery. We remove the entire tube. Now, you probably know this, but many of my educated patients still seem surprised when I say this. 

Even if you have your tubes removed, you still could get pregnant through ivf, meaning you can have the egg in the sperm meat in a Petri dish in the doctor's office, in a fertility doctor's office, and then they can still put it back into your uterus. So women who have embryo. And think they're done having babies but aren't absolutely sure are even more, um, apt to think this is a great idea because even if they have their tubes [00:03:00] removed, they still can get pregnant later. 

So something to consider. Talk about it with your doctor if you're gonna have a c-section. I think it's a really wise idea. I joke that as much as I love delivering babies and frankly my livelihood delivers, is delivering babies now, I love when women are sure that they're done with. Child rearing and child growing because it is an emotionally exhausting task to grow humans. 

So something to think about.