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Sign up for our free e-mail newsletter, HEALTHbeat.   Email address:     Incontinence Weight Loss Prostate Disease Vitamins and Minerals Aching Hands See All Titles Common Medical Conditions Wellness & Prevention Emotional Well Being & Mental Health Women’s Health Men’s Health Heart & Circulatory Health   contact us		What Happens When the Test Is Performed? You lie on your back on an examination table, with your knees bent and your feet in footrests, as you would for a pelvic examination. Your vaginal area is cleaned with an antibacterial soap. This procedure can be done with local, regional, or general anesthesia. Local anesthesia requires injections of numbing medicine into the tissue surrounding your cervix, inside your vagina. You remain awake through the procedure and may feel some cramping in your pelvis. Regional anesthesia for hysteroscopy is done with either a spinal block or epidural block. For this type of anesthesia, a drug is injected through a needle or tube in your lower back by an anesthesiologist. You are awake for the procedure, but you do not feel pain from your pelvic region. If you are having other procedures (such as laparoscopy) done at the same time as hysteroscopy, you might have general anesthesia, which puts you to sleep so you are unconscious during the procedure. General anesthesia is administered by an anesthesiologist, who asks you to breathe a mixture of gases through a mask. After the anesthetic takes effect, a tube may be put down your throat to help you breathe. Once the anesthesia is working, the opening of your cervix may need to be widened. This can be done with instruments that stretch the opening. Your gynecologist inserts the hysteroscope through the vagina and cervix and into the uterus. A liquid or gas is released through the hysteroscope to expand the inside of the uterus so that your doctor has a clearer view. A light at the end of the instrument allows your doctor to see the walls of the uterus and the openings of the fallopian tubes at the top of the uterus. The doctor may also insert small surgical instruments through the hysteroscope to carry out such procedures as taking a sample of tissue (biopsy), removing a polyp or growth, removing the lining of the uterus with dilation and curettage (D&C), or treating the lining of your uterus with ablation electricity to prevent bleeding.
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