Cold Coagluation Without Anaesthetic: My Experience with CIN III

[Suzibelle]

Hi all, so I wanted to write about my experience with the above, as I couldn’t really find any accounts of women who have had this procedure without anaesthetic. There are also a lot more accounts about LLETZ, so for those of you who are going to be having cold coagulation, this is for you. I’m in South Wales. I was diagnosed in December 2020 had the treatment back in January this year. I’m hopefully going to be called soon for my 6 month test of cure, so will update this thread once I have had this.

Background

I’m ashamed to say I was behind on my smears and so my last smear was actually nearly 5 years prior, back in 2016. That smear in 2016 came back inconclusive, and I had to go back to the GP to have another one done, which then came back normal.

I had my most recent standard smear at my GP on 2nd Nov 2020, and then had a letter back way quicker than expected, on 24th November 2020, to tell me the sample came back abnormal.

Initial Colposcopy Appointment

My colposcopy appointment was scheduled for 30th November 2020, so just 6 days after I received the letter. This did concern me but I was pleased they were taking it so seriously. I was the only one in the waiting room and was seen after about 5 minutes. The Colposcopist greeted me and asked me some questions. He told me what would happen, and then I was guided into a changing room by two lovely nurses. I was wearing a dress so they told me I could just take my tights and underwear off and leave my dress on, and could drape the hospital gown over my legs too if I wanted.

I got onto the chair and put my feet on the holds. He inserted the speculum, which was fine, cleaned my cervix which felt a bit weird and then applied two chemicals, one after another. One of them stung slightly but it wasn’t too unpleasant. They asked me if I wanted to have a look on the screen which I initially declined, but then I actually did look because I thought ‘why not’ and I’m glad I did. Although it was pretty gross, it was quite interesting. He told me he could see the abnormality (it looked a bit white on the edge) and, in his opinion, it looked like CIN 1, but would take a biopsy, which he said was about the size of a rice grain. There was a stapler like noise and a pinch. It did shock me a little but I wouldn’t say it really hurt (I’ve had a lot of piercings that were way worse). He then applied silver nitrate which stung again slightly. Then removed the speculum and I could get dressed. The whole process took about 10 minutes and was fine. The doctor told me that if I was to have to get treatment, I’d most likely “be a candidate” for cold coagulation.

Phone Call

I received a phone call on 7th December to say the results had come back as CIN 3 and that they’d booked me in for cold coagulation on 29th December. I was really shocked to say the least. I worried about it quite a lot, only to realise on 22nd December that I hadn’t yet received a letter confirming the time. I thought that maybe the letter had got delayed by Royal Mail. I tried calling the hospital but no one answered, and on 23rd December the switch board told me no one was in the department and I had to ring on 29th (the day of my appointment) as that was the day they were next in. I basically worried about it all over Christmas, and on 29th I rang just to be told I was never booked it. It was awful! However, 3 days later, I received a letter with an appointment on 12th January.

CONTINUED BELOW…

[Suzibelle]

Cold Coagulation

I was worried sick about the cold coagulation. I wasn’t sure why I was chosen to have this treatment as opposed to LLETZ, and had worries about the fact that cold coagulation uses a boiling hot probe to burn off the cells rather than remove them, and therefore they wouldn’t be able to be sent to pathology. I had also been told over the phone I wouldn’t be having local anaesthetic as the pain from the needle was worse than the probe. I couldn’t find any stories of this online, so I was afraid of the pain.

When I arrived, it turns out the Colposcopist I saw last time had retired! So a Nurse Colposcopist greeted me and asked me if I had questions. She told me that they tend to do cold coag on younger women, who hadn’t had children yet. When I asked why this was, she said that the skin will regenerate faster because I was younger. She said she was doing 3 cold coag that day and 5 LLETZ. I was offered LLETZ as an alternative. I asked about the pain and was told it would feel like sudden onset of period pain. She offered the needle but said in their experience, women can tolerate the probe alone and the needle was far worse. I decided to trust her judgement.

It was the same experience as before, however this time I found the speculum very uncomfortable. I’m not sure if it was her technique or whether I was just really tense, I think probably both. She repeated the same cleaning, followed by the application of the two solutions solutions. She confirmed that to her it looked like CIN 3. Then she applied the hot probe, which was a bit bigger than the non-writing end of a pen. I only had one small area of CIN 3, so she told me in advance it would be one application of 20 seconds. One nurse held my hand, and the other timed us. I must say it did hurt, a bit more than I was expecting. It was definitely bearable, but I was sweating. The time went quite quickly and as soon as she removed the probe the pain subsided. She told me my cervix was so small that the probe actually covered almost the entire thing. I felt very faint afterwards, but I think it was the adrenaline and anticipation rather than the actual pain. The nurses were really lovely and let me lie there for a bit, chatting to me, and also offered to walk me to the car to meet my boyfriend.

If I were to have the treatment again, I would probably choose not to have anaesthetic because the thought of the needle to me is worse. The pain was tolerable although unpleasant. Overall, I feel really lucky that I was seen so quickly. I hope this will help someone!