Mercilon

Mercilon is a combined contraceptive pill. This means it’s one of many different pills that are called ‘the pill’.

Mercilon contains lab-made versions of both the oestrogen and progesterone hormones that women naturally have in their bodies.

Mercilon tablets also contain some other ingredients, including:

DL-alpha-tocopherol

• lactose
• potato starch
• povidone
• aerosol
• stearic acid

If you’re allergic to any of these ingredients, then you should let your doctor know, since you won’t be able to take Mercilon.

When you hear ‘Mercilon 21’, it’s means that Mercilon is a 21-day pill. So you’ll take the pill once each day for 21 days, and then you’ll have a 7-day break.

Mercilon can also come in a 28-day packet, where 21 of the pills are your medication and 7 are inactive pills. These don’t contain the active ingredients of your medication – they’re there to help you keep track of your cycle.

With Mercilon 21, your pack has 21 pills. Remember to:

• Take your pill at the same time every day for 21 days – each pill is marked with a day of the week to help you keep track of this
• Follow the direction of the arrows on the strip, which show you the order to take your pills in
• Swallow each pill whole, and don’t chew it
• After you’ve taken your 21 pills, you have 7 days when you take no pills. You don’t need to use extra contraception during these seven days, as long as you’ve taken your pills correctly and you start the next strip of 21 pills on time

If you’re less than 24 hours late to take one pill, or have only missed one pill:

• Take your late pill straight away and keep taking the rest of your pills as usual, even if this means taking two pills in one day
• You should be protected from pregnancy

If you miss 2 or more pills:

• Take the most recently missed pill straight away, but not any others which you might have missed before this
• Take your following pills as usual, even if this means you take two pills in one day
• Use extra contraception for the next 7 days
• Check how many pills are left in the strip after the most recently missed pill. Depending on how many are left, you might need to skip your 7-day break and start your next pack of pills instead

Mercilon has been used in the UK since 1986, so there’s a lot of clinical evidence that it works well as a contraceptive.

Mercilon has been reviewed in studies of healthy women from different countries. Results have been positive, and examples include:

• It’s shown very good control on women’s menstrual cycle, with low side effects
• It’s proved to work well in treating conditions related to androgens, like acne and excessive hair
• It’s had a beneficial effect on (LDL) cholesterol levels

Most doctors now accept that older, ‘first generation’ contraceptive pills might have caused weight gain in some women. These earlier pills had very high hormone levels (oestrogen and progestogen) that could cause fluid build-up, increased appetite, and then weight gain.

The more recent contraceptive pills, like Mercilon, contain a lot less progestogen, and the NHS has published a lot of papers to show that these types of pills don’t cause weight gain in women.

In some cases, though, you might have temporary fluid build-up, but this will pass in about 2 or 3 months.

Despite this, everyone reacts differently to medication, so you might find a small amount of weight gain is possible in the short-term. As you get older too, you naturally put on a little weight each year, so it’s worth bearing this in mind.

The most important factors in maintaining a healthy weight is to have a balance diet and regularly exercise. Changes to your weight while taking the pill can be managed by keeping these general points in mind.