Pelvic Inflammatory disease (PID) is an infection that occurs in the female reproductive tract and is usually caused by a bacterial infection. Women experience symptoms such as nausea, fever, pain on urination, painful menstruation, pain during intercourse, heavy periods or bleeding after intercourse.

PID isn’t diagnosed solely by symptoms alone however. This is because most of the symptoms are also symptoms of other conditions. For instance, nausea, fever, pain on urination and urethritis are all symptoms of both PID and a urinary tract infection.

The symptoms of PID can also mimic genital herpes, vaginitis, endometriosis, fibroids, dyspareunia, cervicitis, acute appendicitis and ovarian cysts. Women and doctors must be diligent in their efforts to determine the exact cause of the symptoms so that other more immediate problems may be addressed (acute appendicitis) and not overlooked.

Failure to diagnose PID can lead to infertility, ectopic pregnancy (leading cause of death in women in the 1st trimester of pregnancy) and anemia. For some women there are no early signs or symptoms of the disease and therefore no reason to see their medical practitioner.