Bayer’s “Look and Feel Great” Marketing Plan for Mirena So Wrong

Turtleford, SKLike countless other women, Bobby was sold on Bayer’s marketing of its Mirena IUD for birth control. Bayer targeted “busy moms” and claimed it would make women “look and feel great.” Unfortunately, “feeling great” couldn’t be further from the truth. And Bayer neglected to warn of Mirena side effects such as Mirena uterine perforation.

“I wanted to try the Mirena because I was so busy and I have four children,” says Bobby. “Prior to that I was on Yasmin but I heard all the bad news about the drospirenone birth control pills. Everything was fine with the IUD for the first two years; I could feel a little bit of string so I knew it was OK.”

Bobby remembers first getting bad stomach cramps, and then one morning the pain was so bad it felt like she was going into labor. Luckily her husband was home - he drove her to the ER, which was an hour away. It was a long drive for Bobby.

“I told the ER doctor that I had a Mirena and he tried to check me but it hurt too much - I had severe abdominal pain,” Bobby explains. The doctor looked with a spectrum and discovered a massive infection; Bobby had pelvic inflammatory disease, or PID. “He told me that I couldn’t move and that I was a ticking time bomb: I couldn’t believe it!”

At Bobby’s request, the doctor explained to her family that she got PID from the Mirena. “I’m a married woman and they would automatically think I had an STD,” she says.

Bobby spent five days in the hospital, with heavy-duty antibiotics to stabilize the infection, and five days worried that she would need a hysterectomy. But the infection hadn’t done that much damage; she had a D&C and her fallopian tubes tied because six cysts in her tubes were causing most of the pain. The Mirena came out and Bobby went home.

Everything was OK for the next six months, except that Bobby had a really heavy flow for seven days with big clots. “I thought that was normal because the doctor warned me that this could happen after the surgery,” says Bobby, “but it got worse. It hurt when I was intimate with my husband and it hurt when I had my period.”

In October of 2012, Bobby had that same abdominal pain again and found out that another cyst had grown on her fallopian tube.

“I was angry; I wanted to have more kids,” says Bobby, crying. “I can’t imagine how women who don’t have any kids can cope when they have experienced severe side effects like a perforated uterus from the Mirena.”

Bobby had another corrective surgery last year. Scar tissue and a polyp that was causing the pain were removed, but she is getting the same pains again and is still worried that she will need a hysterectomy.

“I feel like I am getting the easy fix answers with these surgeries but it’s like putting a band-aid on a bullet wound,” Bobby adds. “I saw two gynecologists and they both said it was the Mirena that caused the infection because it perforated my uterus.

“I am so furious with Bayer, the manufacturer. I figured the pill would be too hectic and I have a phobia of needles and that Nuva ring has bad reviews. Of course we could use condoms but I heard the Mirena gives the most freedom. How wrong that is!”