All of us experience unusually heavy bleeding during the menstrual periods from time to time.  But sometimes we are not able to recognize whether the bleeding is abnormally heavy or normally heavy.  The easiest way to know that your heavy bleeding is menorrhagia is to note how often you need to change your tampon or your pad.

If the bleeding is so heavy that the need to change the pad is at every 2 hours, then you may be experiencing menorrhagia.  There are many reasons why your menstrual bleeding may become too heavy and the following is a list of the top 7 causes:

causes of heavy menstrual bleeding

  1. One of the first major causes of heavy menstrual bleeding is hormonal imbalance during adolescence or during menopause. When the level of hormones fluctuates a lot, this can lead to a heavy menstrual flow during the periods. It is possible to treat menorrhagia with other hormones.
  2. Another common cause of heavy menstrual bleeding is uterine fibroid tumors. There are many types of surgical treatments available for this problem and some of them include uterine artery embalization, myomectomy and endometrial ablation.  There are also some non-surgicalmethods to treat this condition.
  3. Having cervical polyps is yet another condition which can result in very heavy menstrual bleeding. Cervical polyps are small, fragile growths which begin in the endocervical canal or the cervix and are easy to remove or treat. The most common victims of this issue are women over twenty years of age who have had children.
  4. Endometrial polyps are non-cancerous growths which protrude from the lining of the uterus and can cause heavy menstrual flow. Some of the common treatment methods which can treat this condition and hence reduce the heavy flow include hysterectomy and D&C. the cause of this condition however is still unknown.
  5. Another common reason why heavy menstrual bleeding might occur is due to Pelvic Inflammation Disease(PID). This is a kind of an infection which affects one or more than one organ including cervix,fallopian tubes and uterus. This is a sexually transmitted disease which can be treated by taking an antibiotic therapy.
  6. Another major cause of heavy menstrual bleeding is having cervical cancer. This is a type of a cancer which occurs when cells in the cervix become abnormal, multiply out of control or may damage the healthy parts of the body.  The most common cause of cervical cancer is HPV or Human Papillomavirus. Some of the common treatments of cervical cancer include surgery, radiation therapy and chemo therapy.
  7. Endometrial cancer is also one of the top causes of heavy menstrual bleeding. This is a kind of a cancer which occurs in the case when the abnormal cells in the uterus or the endometrium multiply out of control and bring damage to the uterus as well as the other organs. The cause of this disease is still unknown. Hysterectomy is one of the most common treatment opted for to treat endometrial cancer.