Here you will find support and resources for ladies (and their families) who have been afflicted by side-effects and problems caused by the sterilisation implant Essure.
You can read about our experiences too, and tell your story.
We hope to offer information, help, moral and practical support, and importantly, give women a chance to tell their stories and be heard.
If you have questions, or you’d like to share your experiences, please email info@essureproblems.co.uk
Well, it’s been a while since I updated, but I can report that the UK Facebook group is up to 600+ members with new ladies still joining, two years after Essure was removed from the market. Whilst the group admins are happy that ladies are finding us, it’s sad that it’s taken some of them this long to make the connection between ongoing health problems and the possibility that Essure might be contributing to it.
We’re seeing doctors’ attitudes improving – I genuinely believe that the resources available on this site and on the FB group help ladies to address their GPs in terms that they can understand and act upon. However we stil regularly have reports of GPs and gynaecologists ignoring or belittling patients’ research and suggestions, and that’s infuriating. I can’t imagine many other conditions where you’d have to do quite so much homework just to get yourself taken seriously.
If that’s you, SPEAK UP. Shout out loud. Write to everyone you can think of – your CCG, the hospital, the practice manager, the head of department, PALS, your MP, the Health Secretary. Join the FB page and ask for advice and support. Don’t be cowed by authority.
Group case – SPG Law are still collating litigants’ data. This is all going to take time to do properly, but weight of numbers is what will swing it for us. If you’re not in on it, why not? Nothing to lose by trying.
Keep on going.
Alison x
Okay, some very very exciting news!
For a long time, it’s felt like us UK ladies have been left out in the cold. Whilst many of us want to see restitution, the legal firms we’ve spoken to have been dropping Essure cases all too easily. Most if not all cases now are taken on with the intention of pursuing legal action against the NHS Trusts responsible for fitting Essure to their patients, and to the doctors who have performed the procedure.
That’s great, and in plenty of cases it’s entirely warranted. But a lot of us don’t want to see the NHS punished for something that on paper at least, should have been a good decision for patients. The NHS is on it’s knees and we’re grateful to have it. What most of us wanted was to go after the people ultimately responsible for our troubles – Bayer, the pharmaceutical giant who made Essure.
Of course Bayer are massive. They can afford the best legal representatives. No one wanted to tackle them, and claims against the NHS/implanting doctors are going to be far easier to prove. The best way to tackle action against Bayer is in sheer weight of numbers – class actions like this are happening in the US and in lots of other countries too, but until now the idea has been skirted around in the UK.
Yep, until now.
A company called SPG Law are going to give it a go.
The more of us that sign up, the better – the more individual victims they can find, the harder it is for Bayer to argue that Essure side-effects and problems are within an acceptable number. So please, please, PLEASE – get on board.
Signing up is easy and quick at Essureclaimlawyers.com and it’s no-win, no-fee.
Let’s do this. Let’s show those bastards at Bayer that we’ll be heard. We’re not going away.
So it transpires that the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists have rallied journalists all over Europe to launch a co-ordinated project. They’ve spent over a year looking into all kinds of implanted medical devices, the regulation around them, how they are brought to market, and how adverse event data is collected and acted upon.
The results are pretty shocking – none of the Essure group admins had heard the Orange Bag tale before. Is that really how little human life is worth? Well, stacked up against a $400bn industry, it seems so.
Several of us get to tell our tales thanks to the Guardian, and one of our number is featured in a film.
Huge thanks must go to the makers of the Netflix doc The Bleeding Edge; a frightening expose into the US side of the industry. It’s not just Essure that causes issues – we’re talking about lifesavers like pacemakers, artificial joints, hernia repair mesh – it is all governed by the same regulations – the same ones that govern the safety of your kettle, your kids’ toys, your makeup…
Not to mention tomorrow’s Panorama tackling the same issues, a Guardian podcast coming on Tuesday, tomorrow morning’s Victoria Derbyshire show – we’re busy bees!
We talk a lot about the side effects of Essure and how it affects us.
Well, I wanted to talk about having it fitted. I found it horrendous, and I know I’m not alone.
Right then, buckle up folks. Monday 24th Nov is going to be busy.
Panorama on BBC1, 8pm on Monday night – The Great Medical Devices Scandal.
Panorama, esteemed BBC1 investigative current affairs show, is devoting an episode towards the medical devices industry, how it’s regulated (or not!) and what happens when things go wrong… This is going to be major for Essure ladies. If they mention Essure by name (and I suspect they will), then this is going to give us so much exposure. Sadly, it may mean that a lot of ladies who have suffered health issues since having Essure fitted, and haven’t yet made the connection, will be driven to seek answers. So, if that’s you, please please find the support groups on Facebook, check out the stories here, and know that you’re not alone.
To run alongside of this, The Guardian are also running a feature on medical devices which is also going to press on Monday. Add to that another of our E-Sisters will be featured on the Victoria Derbyshire show on Monday morning.
Awareness is growing.
We *will* be heard, and we’re not going away.
Well, we’re almost there – a dedicated band of E-sisters are off to London on Friday, to meet with Baroness Cumberledge. We’re hoping that she will agree to add Essure to her review of UK medical device legislation.
To that end, Lois at the Daily Mail has published a short article today. Some of the comments are rather irritating – the suggestions that we’re in this for compensation (1, we wish! and 2, we’d be lucky), or that we’ve brought it upon ourselves somehow by “messing with nature”, but we’ll dismiss that as yer garden variety trolling.
Of course we’ve tried FOI requests on figures, but the MHRA won’t release any data to us or even to the BBC who have made at least three attempts, and appealed as well.
The more exposure we get, the better – because by sharing our stories like this, we hope to reach women who may not realise that Essure could be responsible for all kinds of issues.
In April a small delegation from the Essure facebook support groups are headed to the House of Lords to meet with Baroness Cumberlege, who is leading a review into how the NHS responds to safety concerns raised by patients about medical devices.
We know that she is including the recently exposed problems with vaginal mesh, and hope to convince her that Essure should certainly be included in her review.
Although the meeting itself is limited in numbers for security reasons, we’d love to see any E-sisters in the area that can meet up afterwards, so please get in touch if you’re interested.
Thanks to Jan F’s daughter Leah who has created this lovely little montage video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7dvm0ForQg
Awwwh, snuggly!
HUGE HUGE thanks to the sponsors at Corries Solicitors for these, and to the lovely peeps at Grafix Monkey for their design input and printing.
We’ve got ourselves some lovely hooded tops. They’re cracking quality and are bound to get people asking “What’s an Essure Survivor?” wherever they are worn.
The first batch were sponsored by Corries, but if you missed out, contact Jan Faulkner on the Facebook support page. There’s a GoFundMe link where we’re raising a bit of cash for ladies that can’t afford to buy one, so if you can donate, please consider it. Also massive thanks to Kerry Michelle who’s running a 10 miler very soon to raise funds!
