The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board in accordance with the Helsinki declaration. Rambam Medical Center is a public hospital, with no private patients and women are treated according to the same standard of guidelines. Women with a benign uterine myoma with or without menometrorrhagia are considered for the study. Patients are excluded if they have a systemic vascular or neurological disease, diabetes or more than two previous abdominal surgeries. A written informed consent, is obtained from the patients prior to randomization into two treatment groups. In the first group 20 ml of 1 % lidocaine were injected subcutaneously in the incisional region 15 minutes prior to the start of operation. In the second group 20 ml of normal saline are injected subcutaneously in the incisional area 15 minutes prior to operation. The syringes containing Lidocaine or Saline solution are prepared and coded by the pharmacist of the hospital. The surgeons, anesthetists and the nursing staff are all blinded to the type of solution, which is injected. The code is disclosed only at the end of the study. The anesthetic technique is standardized. A transverse lower abdominal incision is used in all patients. After completion of operation all patients are treated in the postoperative care unit for two hours. The time of arrival in the postoperative care unit is defined as time zero. Analgesia with morphine and pethidine was provided only on patient request. Thereafter patients are transferred to the Gynecological department.