Histopathological characteristics of adenomyosis: structure and microstructure

Adenomyosis is a benign uterine disease that pathologically shows endometrial glands and stroma in the myometrium. There are multiple lines of evidence that adenomyosis is associated with abnormal bleeding, painful menstruation, chronic pelvic pain, infertility, and spontaneous pregnancy loss. Pathologists have researched adenomyosis by studying tissue specimens from its first report more than 150 years ago, and differing viewpoints on its pathological alterations have been advanced. However, the gold standard histopathological definition of adenomyosis remains controversial to date. The diagnostic accuracy of adenomyosis has steadily increased due to the continual identification of unique molecular markers. This article provides a brief description of the pathological aspects of adenomyosis and discusses adenomyosis categorization based on histology. The clinical findings of uncommon adenomyosis are also presented to offer a thorough and detailed pathological profile. Furthermore, we describe the histological alterations in adenomyosis after medicinal therapy.