Preservation of fertility in women with pelvic inflammatory disease.

The epidemic of sexually transmitted diseases has placed young, sexually active women at risk of infertility from tubal and pelvic factors. Salvaging reproductive function in women desiring fertility depends upon an accurate diagnosis and early, aggressive therapy for all cases of salpingitis. Conservative surgical management of tubal pregnancy in such women is now standard practice. Less-aggressive surgical approaches to chronic pelvic inflammatory disease and even tuboovarian abscess, when possible, can preserve some part of the pelvic anatomy in these women, who may then undergo reconstructive pelvic surgery or in vitro fertilization. Due to the recent technological revolution in infertility therapy, preservation of a women's uterus alone is all that is necessary to sustain the hope for a pregnancy.