When you're trying to combat menopause symptoms, it can seem like you're also fighting against the overwhelming tide of treatments available. It's difficult to know which treatments will actually help ease your symptoms and which are just expensive placebos. Some treatments may even do you harm. In this article we have collated all the expert opinions about bioidentical hormone replacement therapy, so that you can make a more informed decision about your menopause treatment options.
Bioidentical Hormones: Expert Research
Bioidentical hormones were first discovered by the Canadian researcher James Collip, who found a way to extract estrogen from the urine of pregnant women. Since then, the development of bioidentical hormones has moved on, and is now mass produced using compounds extracted from plants. Read on for more expert opinion on bioidentical hormones, including the benefits and pitfalls of their use.
How Bioidentical Hormones Work
During menopause, hormonal fluctuations cause disruption to your body's regulatory system. The usually reliable hormonal system, which controls functions like sleep, eating, and mood, can go wrong, resulting in menopause symptoms.
To combat this, you need something that works to redress the balance. Bioidentical hormones work by topping up your low levels of natural hormones with artificial hormones, which helps your menopausal transition, go more smoothly, avoiding the side effects of a sudden drop in hormone levels. This is an effective treatment in reducing the severity of menopause symptoms, but it shouldn't be used to avoid the natural process of menopause.
Read on to learn more about the benefits associated with bioidentical hormones.
The Benefits of Using Bioidentical Hormones
Benefits of using bioidentical hormones include: reduced levels of menopause symptoms and reduced chances of developing osteoporosis in postmenopause. However, it is also suggested that there is a lack of evidence to support these claims and that bioidentical hormones may even cause the user damage.
Some practitioners also employ bioidentical hormones as a means of reducing the effects of the ageing process. However, the use of bioidentical hormones for this purpose has not yet been fully studied.
Read on to learn more about the dangers of bioidentical hormones.
The Dangers of Using Bioidentical Hormones
Although bioidentical hormones are extracted from plants, they are created in a laboratory, and should not be considered a natural estrogen. As with most man-made treatments, bioidentical hormones come with adverse side effects including a higher risk of having a stroke, heart disease, and certain cancers. Thankfully, there are other ways to control you hormones.
