4 Potential Causes of Heavy Periods

Under the best of circumstances, periods can be an inconvenient hassle, but when you're dealing with heavy periods, your quality of life can take a serious hit.

Medically known as menorrhagia, millions of women are in the same boat as you when it comes to heavy periods. In the United States alone, about 10 million women in any given year report heavy menstrual bleeding.

While the hassle of heavier-than-normal periods is enough to worry about, our concern is that it may be a symptom of an underlying issue. 

Our multidisciplinary healthcare team at LaSante Health Center includes specialists in gynecology, and many women come to us to get to the bottom of heavy bleeding. Here’s what we’ve found to be among the most common culprits.

Defining heavy bleeding

Let’s first define what we mean by heavy bleeding, which typically takes one or more of the following characteristics:

• Bleeding that soaks through tampons and/or pads every hour or two
• Bleeding through tampons and pads at night
• Bleeding for more than seven days
• The need to double up on protection
• The presence of large blood clots

In severe cases of heavy bleeding, you can become sluggish due to anemia and lack of red blood cells.

Common causes of heavy bleeding during periods

If you can check any of the boxes above for heavy bleeding, there are several possible culprits, including:

Hormone issues

Your periods are regulated by hormone activity, so if you have a hormone imbalance, it can lead to heavy periods. Hormone imbalances in women can stem from polycystic ovary syndrome, thyroid issues, and other ovulation disorders.

Sexually transmitted infections

Another road to heavy bleeding is an untreated sexually transmitted disease (STD), which can lead to pelvic inflammatory disease. These STD infections are still making their rounds, and in 2023 in the US, there were more than 2.4 million cases of syphilis, gonorrhea, and chlamydia.

Uterine fibroids and other benign growths

If you have a growth in your uterus, such as uterine fibroids, which are very common, you can develop heavy bleeding in response.

Certain cancers

A less common cause of heavy bleeding are certain reproductive cancers, such as uterine and cervical cancer. Aside from heavy bleeding, you can also experience bleeding between periods (spotting).

There are other potential causes of heavy bleeding, but the above account for more than their fair share of the overall burden.

The bottom line is that you shouldn't ignore heavy bleeding. Not only does the issue disrupt your life, it may also be pointing to another problem that we should address.

For expert diagnosis and treatment of your abnormal bleeding, we invite you to book an appointment online or call us at our Brooklyn, New York, clinic at 718-355-8616. We also welcome walk-ins during our hours of operation. 

Our team proudly serves the Flatbush and East Flatbush, Crown Heights, Park Slope, Little Haiti, Little Caribbean, and Prospect Lefferts Gardens communities.