What is the treatment for a polycystic ovarian disease in 17 yr old girl facial hair harmone & weight problem?

Treatment of Polycystic Ovary (PCO) depends on the patient's desires. If she want to become pregnant then drugs are prescribed to induce ovulation. If she wants to regulate her periods and control facial hair, birth control pills are usually given either alone or in combination with another drug called spironolactone. Spironolactone acts directly on the hair follicle to inhibit growth of new hair. Existing hair will need to be removed by some physical means such as electrolysis. It takes at least 6 months to notice any benefit of medical therapy for facial hair growth. In time, however, patients can decrease or even eliminate their need for electrolysis. Birth control pills obviously preclude pregnancy and spironolactone is contraindicated during pregnancy. Therefore women wanting to become pregnant will have to forego the medical treatment of their facial hair.

If pregnancy is desired ovulation is induced with medication. Clomiphene citrate (trade names Clomid , Serophene) is the first-line drug. Approximately 80% of women with PCO will ovulate when given clomiphene, but only one-half of those that ovulate will get pregnant. The reason(s) why the other one-half do not conceive is not known with certainty. Women who do not ovulate with clomiphene have two options. The traditional approach is to give another class of drugs called "gonadotropins". These drugs are given as either a subcutaneous injection or intramuscular injection (Gonal-F, Follistim, Repronex). Although the subcutaneous route of administration is easier and less painful, there is no evidence that any one of these drugs is better than the other when pregnancy is the endpoint. Close monitoring with frequent vaginal ultrasounds and blood tests is mandatory when taking these drugs. There often is a very fine line between not enough and too much of these drugs. Gonadotropins are potentially very dangerous drugs and should be administered only by physicians with extensive experience in their usage. Gonadotropin therapy is a reasonable option in those women who have not ovulated with clomiphene.

Another treatment for PCO is the use of an "insulin sensitizing" drug. The drug most commonly used is metformin (trade name Glucophage). There are other similar drugs and more are sure to come in the next few years. By lowering insulin levels the ovary appears to be able to ovulate either on its own or in response to clomiphene therapy. Not all PCO patients will respond to this therapy. Ideally, only those patients who have documented insulin resistance should be tried on this drug. However, some research studies have given this drug to all PCO patients, without regard to their insulin levels. Most of the studies to date have not looked at pregnancy as the end point when metformin was given. How metformin will fit in to our overall treatment of PCO related infertility remains to be determined. In our practice we screen PCO patients for insulin resistance and offer metformin therapy to those found to be resistant.

Was this girl diagnosed with it recently? I was told I had it when I was 19 but was never given a treatment for it. Then 4 years later when I went to another docotor for my recent weight gain they said it was my underactive thyroid and that POD was an old diagnosis...that I guess they dont really use that term anymore...may get the thyroid checked...

huh

Well, Mukherd answered very efficiently. I can tell you as a woman the age of 30 who was diagnosed with PCOS when I was 17, it's a tough thing to deal with. I started my cycle when I was 16 1/2 and my cycles were very irregular. That, my weight and my excess fcaial hair brought me to an endocrinologist, who put me on spirinolactone. I've been on it twice since then and never noticed any difference.
I've been on birth control pills steadily for almost 7 years and they've greatly helped regulate my cycle. It comes every 28 days now. I've had numerous sessions of laser treatment(which is expensive but works well) and a few electrolosis sessions. Laser hair removal works best for women with fair skin and dark hair, electrolosis works on all skin types, I think.
There are a lot of books and websites out there on PCOS. It used to be known as Stein-Levinthal disease, and is also known as polycystic ovarian syndrome(PCOS). Good luck!