Endometriosis appears to be flavour of the month in the gastroenterological literature. This month (March 2012) there is another paper in the journal , “Gut” showing connections between endometriosis and irritable bowel syndrome (IBS).
This study compares 20 women with either “mild” endo, severe endo, chronic pelvic pain without endo, or, laparoscopic sterilisation (no pain). Each had a balloon inflated in their rectum. Women with endo had more pain at lower distension pressures than the other groups. This information is open to a number of interpretations. The authors believe that women with endo are (not surprisingly) more sensitive to pain than the other groups. There are a number of inferences though the data is consistent, in some respects, with the “autonomic denervation” view.