The singer Imany is the guest this Sunday of the Matinale weekend of RMC. Victim of endometriosis since adolescence, she talks about her fight to make this disease known, for its recognition in long-term affection and for the reimbursement of its care.
It is an evil that for too long has been passed over in silence. Endometriosis affects one in ten women in France. A gynecological disease, a period disorder where uterine cells are found elsewhere than in the uterus and disintegrate in the intestine, on the ovaries, causing intense pain.
“A problem of medical wandering”
This disease, medical knowledge of which is currently relatively undeveloped, whether in the medical community or in the general public, is difficult to detect. “A problem of medical wandering”, judge Imany who testifies:
“Between the time when you are in pain and when you find out what you have, 8 years go by. I was right in this statistic. Since adolescence and it was only at the age of 23 that a gynecologist told me that could be it,” she explains.
A simpler method has been found to detect this disease: a saliva test, developed by a French team. Not yet put on the market, this method allows in three days to know if you have endometriosis or not. Imany is asking for “a boost from the state so that the saliva test is reimbursable because, for the moment, it is too expensive.”
Breaking the taboo around menstruation
To advance this cause, Imany believes that the taboo around periods must be broken. “Women don’t like to talk about it. Men don’t like to talk about it,” says the singer of You Will Never Know.
“We have to talk about it in the media, at school, at home, everywhere (…) We have to democratize the conversation around periods because it’s a banal thing in a woman’s life” , she says.
Reimburse support
Another idea put forward by Imany, the reimbursement of support. Even if there is no treatment for endometriosis, there are specialists “that we can go to for the treatment of pain.”
Problem: these sessions are expensive and it is not reimbursed. A major problem for Imany, who is requesting placement in a long-term condition (ALD30) for endometriosis:
“When you have the means either, but when you don’t have them, you have to be able to help you. Because otherwise it’s double trouble. You’re bent over backwards, you can’t go to work, you tend to not being able to keep a job, you are precarious and on top of that, the few things you have available you cannot afford them”, she explains.
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