White Dress Project now in PE
When Dr Gary Sudwarts was a teenager he watched his mother suffering as she recovered from a hysterectomy – one that was necessary because she suffered from fibroids – and it was then that the seeds for his involvement in the White Dress Project were sown.
Now women in Port Elizabeth suffering from the debilitating condition will benefit from the doctor’s memories from that time.
Sudwarts, 40, a Cape Town radiologist with a special interest in interventional radiology, will be heading up the launch of The Fibroids Treatment Clinic – The White Dress Project – in the Bay this weekend.
The initiative aims to benefit women in the Bay who are dependent on state hospital care, much like the work Sudwarts has done at Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, where he has been performing uterine fibroid embolisations (UFE) on state-funded patients.
“My mother had a hysterectomy for fibroids when I was 14. I remember her lying in bed for weeks, recovering.
“The defeminising loss of her uterus had a profound effect on her,” Sudwarts said.
“When I became a radiologist, I realised that I had a skill that could save many women the ordeal of major surgery for their fibroids.”
Having worked for many years as a general radiologist and training doctors in radiology, he now devotes most of his time to the micro-invasive treatment of uterine fibroids.
He works closely with gynaecologists and fertility specialists.
The Fibroids Treatment Clinic has entered into a joint venture with Port Elizabethbased Bayradiology to launch the project in the region.
The partnership will offer life-changing interventions to women who have fibroids – uterine growths that cause excessive bleeding, debilitating pain, anaemia and sometimes prevent pregnancy.
“We are delighted to work with Bayradiology to provide uterine fibroid embolisation procedures for women living in and around PE.
“UFE is a highly effective and far less invasive alternative, with many patients going on to live normal lives, conceive and give birth – and wear a white dress or two,” Sudwarts said.
Explaining the initiative’s name, he said: “Wearing a white dress is unthinkable for a woman with fibroids, as often she has no advance warning of when [menstruation] will begin, and it can arrive in a flood.
“Through undergoing UFE, women can then wear white, if they want to – something many take for granted.
“It’s also a colour often associated with a clean slate, and a new beginning.”
The White Dress Project was started by American Tanika Gray, whose mother lost her twins as a result of fibroids.
On The White Dress Project website, Gray said: “It was very important to me to have a voice for the millions of women who have suffered the same way my mother did.”
Sudwarts said: “This is a large public health issue for women. We want to create a conversation around a taboo topic [which] affects millions of women in South Africa.”