How Can Hormone Levels Affect the Heart?
Your hormones are the chemical messengers of your body, and they affect just about every process that goes on inside your body, not just your reproductive system. Weight, sleep, appetite, growth, even body temperature– all of these things are affected by changing levels of hormones in your system. You might’ve known this fact already, and maybe you’re familiar with other bodily processes that your hormones affect, but did you know that your hormones also play a role in your cardiac health? The different levels of estrogen, testosterone, and progesterone in your system can change how your heart functions and can even raise or lower your risk of cardiovascular disease. Let’s take a look at how your hormones can affect your heart health.
Estrogen
While estrogen’s primary function is as the female sex hormone, it has a surpisingly strong effect on cardiovascular health. Studies show that leading cause of death in postmenopausal women is heart disease. Although this connection is still being studied, the evidence suggests a correlation between the increased risk of heart disease following menopause and the dropping estrogen levels that occur at the same time, which seems to line up with the various functions of the hormone. Estrogen can improve the ability of your blood vessels to dilate and respond to changes in blood pressure, and they also help you to avoid clots.
There have been some studies that would seem to disprove the theory that dropping estrogen levels are bad for your heart, where postmenopausal women who were undergoing hormone replacement therapy didn’t see any benefits from increased estrogen. However, in these studies, the women were taking orally-dosed estrogen that affects cardiovascular health in different ways and can sometimes cause more harm than good. Naturally derived estrogen that is delivered percutaneously (under the skin) like the kind offered by Renewed Vitality has been shown to have more positive effects on heart health.
Testosterone
Lower levels of testosterone are not only associated with cardiovascular disease, they’re associated with other conditions that can eventually lead to cardiovascular disease, such as insulin resistance, metabolic syndrome and diabetes. Between 27 and 36 percent of men who experience heart failure are also testosterone deficient, so much like estrogen, the connection is still being studied, but a correlation between testosterone levels and heart health is certainly present.
Testosterone has some vasodilatory effects (the dilation of veins) just like estrogen, and also plays a role in fighting inflammation and influencing muscular strength. Because of all of these things, testosterone replacement therapy has been shown to have positive effects for heart failure patients, including female patients, increasing functional capacity and decreasing other heart failure symptoms without major side effects.
Progesterone
Progesterone’s relationship to heart health is a little complicated. Part of this is due to the role progesterone plays in the production of cortisol, the body’s stress hormone that also acts as an anti-inflammatory agent. Heart disease means lots of inflammation, so cortisol is one of the tools the body uses to fight back The body uses progesterone to make cortisol, and in times of stress where lots of cortisol is needed, your body could become deficient in progesterone and experience a hormonal imbalance.
The other part of progesterone’s relationship to heart health has to do with a confusion in terms between natural and synthetic progesterone. The naturally occurring hormone has no negative effects on the cardiovascular system, but synthetic progesterone, or progestin, can be detrimental to the blood vessel walls and may increase clotting. This poses a problem, especially when a heart issue creates a progesterone imbalance due to high cortisol production. However, it’s been found that bioidentical progesterone hormone replacement treatment, like the kind offered by Renewed Vitality, doesn’t share the same risks as progestin and can be a useful treatment to help these imbalances.
As you can see, the relationship between your hormones and your heart is complicated and interconnected, with lots of studies still being conducted today. However, reliable bioidentical hormone replacement therapy has been well-established as helpful in cases of cardiovascular disease, so if you’re interested in learning more about how Renewed Vitality can help you, don’t hesitate to contact us.
Your thyroid is a small gland at the front of your neck that produces a lot of your body’s hormones. When your thyroid, for one reason or another, doesn’t produce hormones correctly, you either have hypothyroidism, which is when hormone levels are too low, or hyperthyroidism, when they’re too high. Issues with the thyroid can affect people of all ages and can seriously influence your health across the board, but a lot of the time these conditions aren’t easy to catch early on because their symptoms can be subtle, and you might think that they don’t mean anything or that they have another cause. All health issues are best caught early on, including thyroid problems, so if you’re experiencing any of these symptoms and other explanations aren’t adding up, it’s possible that there’s something going on with your thyroid.
Digestive Problems
A lot of symptoms of thyroid problems can present on opposite ends of a spectrum depending on whether you’re dealing with hyperthyroidism or hypothyroidism, and digestion is definitely one of them. With hyperthyroidism, you may have very loose stools, and with hypothyroidism, you may find yourself frequently constipated. These issues can of course have many other causes, but if you’re experiencing other signs of thyroid dysfunction, and especially if these digestive problems are unusual for you, it’s important not to dismiss them.
Mood Problems
Higher or lower levels of hormones than what your body needs can lead to your moods changing in ways that are difficult to handle, causing you to potentially struggle with anger or low moods when you didn’t previously. If anxiety, depression, or anger issues aren’t things you typically struggle with and now you’re experiencing them for seemingly no reason, your thyroid might be to blame.
Unexpected Changes in Weight
This is a big one that you should never ignore if it happens to you. If you notice a big change in your weight suddenly or unexpectedly, it’s a sign that something is going on. This can mean weight gain but also weight loss, and although you may be pleased to find yourself mysteriously shedding pounds, unexplained weight loss is as much of a health red flag as unexplained weight gain is, and both should be discussed with your doctor if they happen to you.
Hair Loss
If you find yourself losing more hair than usual in the shower or when you brush it, or if your hair is just looking really thin and you’re finding balding spots, a thyroid issue might be the culprit. As with many warning signs of thyroid problems, this once can have some other causes. If you’re a man and baldness runs in your family, for example, then thinning hair might not surprise you, or if you’re under a serious amount of stress in your life, you might find your hair starting to fall out in noticeable amounts, but if you notice your hair thinning along with other signs of thyroid issues, you should discuss it with your doctor.
Changes in How You Experience Temperature
This sign can be subtle and difficult to notice, but if you find yourself feeling much hotter or colder than normal, or having less tolerance to hot and cold weather, it can indicate that your thyroid isn’t functioning properly. This one mostly comes down to your personal baseline. Some people just run hot or cold! But if you suddenly want to keep your coat and gloves on inside the house all the time and can’t figure out why, or you’re red-faced and sweaty on a day where the heat normally wouldn’t have bothered you as much, it’s not something to just sweep aside.
Hypothyroidism and hyperthyroidism are treatable, but ignoring the signs of these conditions can have serious effects on your health and your life, so if you notice symptoms such as these that are unusual and not easily explained by something else, don’t ignore them. Getting tested for thyroid problems is simple and can help you get the treatment you need. If you live in the Berks County area and you suspect there may be something wrong with your thyroid, contact Renewed Vitality. We are the premier facility for hormone replacement therapy in the area, and we are ready to help you.
Every woman knows to expect menopause as she ages. The average age to experience it is 51 for women in the United States, but any time between ages 45 to 55 is considered within the normal range. Menopause before age 45 is considered early, and before age 40 is premature.
So, how do you know if you’re in premature menopause? For starters, there is a difference between menopause and perimenopause, which is the process of heading into menopause itself. When you’ve gone more than twelve months without a period, you’ve entered menopause, but prior to this as your ovulation slows, you’ll be in perimenopause and begin experiencing the symptoms that you always hear people talking about– hot flashes and chills, mood changes, sleep problems, and of course, irregular periods. A changing period is the main sign of menopause, and while there are many reasons to have irregular or missing periods, you should always discuss it with your doctor. If you’re presenting other symptoms and not within the typical age range, they may diagnose you with premature menopause. There are many reasons that this might happen to you, and they will help you to determine the cause and cope with the changes. Here are some of the reasons you might begin menopause prematurely.
Previous Illnesses
If you’ve undergone chemotherapy, had your ovaries removed, or had any other treatment or procedure that would damage your estrogen production, it may lead to premature menopause. However, damaged or missing ovaries are not the only potential cause, and you can still experience premature menopause if your ovaries are intact.
Genetics
It is likely that there is a genetic component to when you will naturally begin menopause. If other explanations don’t fit, this may be what it comes down to. If your mother experienced menopause early or prematurely, it’s possible that you will as well.
Lifestyle
There are some habits that you might’ve had (or might still have) in previous years that can affect your reproductive health, with smoking being a major one. Long-term or regular smoking has been proven to have a correlation to earlier menopause than that seen in women who don’t smoke. Other lifestyle choices that may contribute are vegetarianism, lack of exercise, lack of sun exposure, and low BMI.
Chromosomal Defects
There are several chromosomal abnormalities that can lead to premature menopause. Most of them do this by affecting the function of the ovaries. Turner syndrome, pure gonadal dysgenesis, and Fragile X syndrome are all possible causes. If you or any family members have premature menopause and you suspect that one of these conditions might be the cause, it’s important to discuss genetic testing with your doctor.
Autoimmune Disease
Autoimmune diseases can cause a whole host of health issues, including premature menopause. When inflammation caused by these diseases affects the ovaries, their function is altered or stopped. Rheumatoid arthritis and thyroid problems are potential autoimmune diseases that may be the cause of your premature menopause.
Epilepsy
Epilepsy can sometimes cause the ovaries to fail prematurely, and resultantly lead to early or premature menopause in about 14% of women with the disease.
Depending on the cause of your premature menopause, hormone therapy might be a good treatment option for you to help lessen the symptoms. Bioidentical hormone replacement therapy, like the kind offered at Renewed Vitality, can improve your quality of life during perimenopause and menopause. Most of the adverse symptoms of menopause stem from a change in your body’s estrogen levels, and by adding in estrogen that is no longer being produced, some of those symptoms can be eased. Bioidentical hormones are exactly what they sound like– they’re biologically identical to the ones naturally produced in your body. Renewed Vitality’s bioidentical estrogen is 100% natural, created using a plant-based source. Their exact chemical structure matches the kind made by the human body, and their natural makeup allows them to be more easily processed than artificial varieties.
If you are suffering from premature menopause, or if the symptoms of menopause and perimenopause in general are causing you distress, contact Renewed Vitality to ask about our bioidentical hormone replacement therapy. It may be able to help you feel a bit more like yourself again.
Infertility is a common condition and impacts about 20 percent of all couples. An official medical diagnosis of infertility is usually given when a couple has been unsuccessful after trying to conceive over a full year’s time. When the cause of infertility appears to result from the female partner, it is called female infertility. Female infertility factors contribute to about 50% of all infertility cases, and infertility in women makes up about one-third of all infertility cases.
Becoming pregnant and carrying a pregnancy to term are physically and emotionally taxing processes with a lot of complicated aspects. Quite a few things can go wrong during the pregnancy process and ultimately lead to infertility.
The list below includes only some of the common causes of infertility, and any woman experiencing difficulty getting pregnant or carrying a pregnancy to term should contact her healthcare provider about potential treatments.
What will a doctor evaluate to diagnose female infertility?
Your trusted healthcare provider will need details about your menstrual periods, any previous pregnancies, miscarriages, pelvic pain, abnormal vaginal bleeding, or vaginal discharge. You may also be asked for information about previous pelvic infections or sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Some of the medical questions professionals may ask include:
- Have you previously been pregnant or had any miscarriages?
- Does your menstrual cycle feel normal and seem on-time or is it painful and irregular?
- Are you experiencing heavy bleeding or abnormal discharge?
- Have you previously undergone any abdominal surgeries?
What causes female infertility to occur?
There are a wide range of potential causes for female infertility, but it can be challenging to specify the precise one. There are plenty of couples who even experience “undetermined” infertility or “multi-factor” infertility (meaning multiple causes, often from both male and female factors). Some potential causes include:
Uterus Issues: Problems with the uterus may include polyps, fibroids, septum, or adhesions within the uterine cavity. Polyps and fibroids in particular could form at any time while other issues (like a septum) can be with you since birth or come as a result of surgery, like for dilations and curettage.
Ovulation Complications: There are a large variety of reasons why a woman might not be ovulating normally. Ovulation difficulty usually results from things like hormonal imbalances, a history with eating disorders, substance abuse, abnormal thyroid conditions, severe stress, and even pituitary tumors.
Fallopian Tube Problems: Infertility that results from “tubal factors” typically include pelvic inflammatory disease that results from having chlamydia and gonorrhea.
Egg Number And Quality: At birth, women come into the world with all the eggs their body will ever produce, and these carry the potential to leave the body early and entirely, all before menopause. Some eggs will even have the wrong number of chromosomes and won’t be able to grow into a healthy fetus. Some of these chromosomal problems (including “balanced translocation”) may affect every egg, while others occur more chaotically but become increasingly common as a woman ages.
At Renewed Vitality, our dedicated teams are focused on helping people stay informed and passionate about their lives and health, including for infertility problems and associated conditions like low estrogen levels and hormone complications.
We are also the Berks County area’s premier facility for hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and other treatments. We serve both men and women, offering safe, effective care that relieves hormone imbalance symptoms and restores quality of life for patients at all stages of life. To learn more, don’t hesitate to contact Renewed Vitality today!
In this busy day and age, we’re not always the best about listening to our bodies, but a missed period will set off alarm bells in most women’s heads as a clear sign that something is up. The most obvious answer is that amenorrhea (the medical term for a missing period) is a sign of pregnancy, but for those who are not sexually active or for whom a pregnancy test has ruled that reason out, what could be the root cause of a missed period? Turns out, there are a lot of potential reasons.
For starters, how long should you be skipping periods before you start to worry? Typically once a pregnancy has been ruled out, the time span varies based on regularity. If you’re usually very regular, start talking to your doctor after a few months have passed. If you have a history of being irregular, six to nine months is usually the time to start looking for the cause of your amenorrhea.
Nutrition and Lifestyle
When the body doesn’t receive enough nutrients, endures exercise that is too intense, or a combination of those factors, the reproductive system shuts down to try to help the body cope with the physical stress. Amenorrhea is a common symptom of eating disorders for this reason, but it’s also seen in athletes or people with intense and unhealthy fitness regimens. You may see the myth floating around in weight loss and exercise circles that a missing period means you’re on the right track and working hard enough, but this is false– and dangerous. If you’ve noticed your period stopping as a result of your diet and physical activity, it’s time to reassess. Make sure you’re getting enough nutrients of all kinds and not over-exerting yourself when you exercise.
PCOS
PCOS, or polycystic ovarian syndrome, is a hormonal disorder, and even though it’s fairly common, it is often overlooked. Irregular or missing periods are a symptom of PCOS, as well as infertility problems, weight struggles, and excessive body hair and acne. A doctor can diagnose PCOS through checking your hormone levels with a blood test. If you suspect you have PCOS, it’s important to bring it up to your doctor and ask about being tested, because women with PCOS are at a higher risk for diabetes, and you may need regular screening to help you avoid this additional problem.
Thyroid Disease
If tests have ruled out hormonal problems like PCOS but you’re still having trouble figuring out why your period is missing, it’s possible that your thyroid might be the problem. Because there are so many potential causes for amenorrhea, the thyroid isn’t often the first thing doctors test for, but it is important to consider it as a factor when other explanations don’t add up.
Birth Control
Going off the pill and suddenly having a missing period can be a shock when you’ve gotten used to the regularity that the pill offers, but it’s not unheard of. Some women do experience about four to six months of amenorrhea after stopping the pill, so if you’ve just cancelled your prescription, make sure you rule out pregnancy as a cause, and then give your period a little time to come back before you really start worrying.
Menopause
We all know that menopause marks the end of our menstruating years, but your period won’t just stop dead as you approach this age. In most cases, it’s a slower process in which your period becomes irregular and unpredictable, often just skipping a month. It’s important to note that you can still become pregnant at this time in your life! When your period is irregular it becomes harder to predict ovulation, so make sure you stay on top of your birth control methods if a baby isn’t in the cards for you at this time.
Breastfeeding
With the craziness that accompanies a new baby, you may be grateful to hear that periods often stop during breastfeeding, especially if you are exclusively breastfeeding. During the weaning process it may crop back up and be irregular at first before settling back into your natural cycle, but again remember that missing or irregular periods does not mean it’s impossible for you to get pregnant. Ovulation comes before the period, and it can still happen if you aren’t careful.
Stress
There’s a good reason that medical professionals of all types are always urging their patients to lower their stress levels. Stress really can damage your physical health, and one of the telltale signs of this is menstruation coming to a stop. When stress of any kind becomes intense enough, the body goes through changes that allow it to better handle danger, and one of these changes is shutting down the reproductive system. If tests and discussion with your doctor have ruled out other causes and conditions, it may come down to the stress of your life forcing your body into a constant state of fight or flight.
With these potential causes for a missing period in mind, you’re now ready to take charge of your own health and get to the bottom of what’s going on with your body. Renewed Vitality is passionate about helping people stay informed and involved in their health. We are the Berks County area’s top facility for hormone replacement therapy and other treatments. To learn more, don’t hesitate to contact us!
While their role in the healthy functioning of our bodies is of the utmost importance, our bodies’ hormones are particularly fickle beings. These vital chemicals require a delicate balance that we must keep in check via proper diet, exercise, lifestyle, and behavior.
While hormones will naturally decline as you continue aging, there are certain medical conditions that may be responsible for unusually low levels of sex hormones. Courtesy of Renewed Vitality, you can read more about five of them right here.
Anorexia
Anorexia nervosa is a condition in which a person purposely loses an unhealthy amount of weight through extreme dieting and sometimes excessive exercise, bingeing, and/or purging.
Like many eating disorders, Anorexia can lead to issues with bone density, delayed puberty, higher risks of osteoporosis, anxiety and depression, a decreased sex drive, and several hormonal balancing problems like low estrogen, amenorrhea, and low testosterone.
If you suspect that you or someone you know is suffering from anorexia, you can get help from a primary care doctor, dietician, or a mental health professional with experience in the field of eating disorders.
Endometriosis
Endometriosis is a condition in which the tissue found inside the uterus grows in places where it is not biologically supposed to grow.
Normally, the uterus is lined with tissue (endometrium) that grows and thickens every month is preparation for the possibility of pregnancy. This monthly process is controlled by ovarian estrogen hormones. If pregnancy does not occur in a given month, this tissue breaks down and leaves the body in the form of your period.
In a person with endometriosis however, problems with this system arise when endometrial tissue grows in areas outside of the uterus, including the ovaries, fallopian tubes, the bladder, bowels or rectum, or on the tissue that lines the pelvis.
Not only can this condition cause chronic pain and infertility, it can also lead to a dramatic imbalancing of vital sex hormones.
Cancer
Cancer is a serious medical condition characterized by rapid cell growth that may cause the formation of abnormal masses on vital organs within the body. These masses are known as “tumors” and can either be identified as benign (non-cancerous, lacking the ability to spread) or malignant (cancerous, including the ability to spread).
Often, various forms of cancer, including breast cancer, testicular cancer, ovarian cancer, and pancreatic cancer can negatively impact your endocrine system, which is responsible for regulating the secretion of your body’s various hormones.
Did you know that hormonal balance is important in decreasing your risk of cancer? For more information, or if you have concerns about your hormones or your genetic predisposition to endocrine cancers, speak to a professional endocrinologist as soon as possible.
Diabetes
Diabetes is an incredibly common medical condition. In fact, one in eleven adults worldwide has diabetes, which constantly puts endocrinologists on the front lines of the public health crisis. In the United States, about 30 million Americans have been diagnosed with diabetes, and another 7 million are living undiagnosed with the disease.
Diabetes occurs when the pancreas, a vital gland located behind the stomach, fails to produce enough of the hormone insulin, which is responsible for carrying sugar from the bloodstream into the cells. There are two main types of diabetes: type 1 and type 2.
Type 1 diabetes occurs when the pancreas makes little to no insulin. People with type 1 diabetes must take insulin everyday in order to supplement the insulin that their bodies are unable to naturally produce.
Type 2 diabetes is the most common form of the disease, affecting 90-95 percent of those suffering from the condition. It occurs when the body becomes resistant to the action of insulin, preventing it from properly carrying sugar into the cells.
Diabetes makes it difficult to keep your glucose levels in check, but doing so will greatly lower your chances of developing long-term complications with hormonal balance. In addition, treatments like hormone replacement therapy can help make this process easier.
Menopause
Menopause is a condition that occurs in every biological female at some point during their lives. Typically, menopause is officially diagnosed if you have been period-free for one year without being pregnant, breast-feeding, sick, or taking other medications. Over the course of menopause, women are likely to experience more erratic periods which may be shorter, longer, heavier, or lighter, before they eventually stop altogether.
In the years leading up to menopause, a woman’s ovaries will shrink in size and the amount of hormones (specifically estrogen) they produce will fluctuate. While menopause is a perfectly natural condition, it can unfortunately lead to symptoms including hot flashes and vaginal dryness.
Luckily, Hormone Replacement Therapy is a great way to treat these symptoms, especially in menopausal women. At Renewed Vitality, we specialize in helping people get their lives back and achieve their dreams. We are the Berks County area’s premier facility for hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and other treatments.
We serve both men and women, offering safe, effective care that relieves hormone imbalance symptoms and restores quality of life for patients at all stages of life. To learn more, don’t hesitate to contact Renewed Vitality in Wyomissing, PA today!
Sleep is essential for restoring our brain and nervous system to full functionality each and every night. When sleep is interrupted, it can put us in an irritable mood and throw off our entire day. If problems sleeping persist, it could open the door to larger problems with both your physical and mental well-being.
Sometimes, it can be difficult to pinpoint exactly why we are having problems with our sleep. Typically, many will tell you their insomnia is caused by stress, anxiety, depression, or some other mental illness. While this hypothesis certainly has scientific merit, there are many others that can be sometimes overlooked in diagnosis.
One of the many variables that affect our sleep patterns is our hormones. These chemical messengers are quite powerful, and have many important roles to play throughout your body. Often, the first step to getting to the root of your sleeping trouble is to understand the many hormones that may be impacting you. Read on to learn more about some of your body’s most important hormones, and how they may be related to restlessness.
Cortisol
The hormone cortisol is your body’s primary stress hormone. It is essential in your mind and body’s ability to recognize and defend itself against threats during the activation of your flight-or-fight response.
However, what many don’t realize, is that cortisol acts in direct opposition to melatonin, the body’s main sleep hormone. In an effort to maintain your personal circadian rhythm, cortisol levels rise overnight to peak in the morning, then drop throughout the day until you begin to feel tired.
Sometimes, this cycle can be thrown off due to chronic stress, which causes overly high levels of cortisol release. Therefore, when many say that stress or anxiety is causing their issues with sleep, this corresponds with high cortisol levels.
Various lifestyle changes, such as limiting food and drug intake, exercising, and eating healthier can help reduce stress and may help to compensate for and correct these irregularities.
Thyroid
Thyroid is a vital hormone that is mainly responsible for regulating normal body functions such as growth, metabolism, and development, In addition, it is responsible for many automatic body functions such as your heartbeat, temperature regulation, and how well you burn calories.
Both too much and too little thyroid hormone can have significant implications on how well you sleep. As one study put it: “Hypothyroidism results in poor sleep quality and architecture, whereas hyperthyroidism adversely impacts sleep by reducing sleep efficiency and duration, and increasing sleep latency.”
Proper realignment of thyroid gland requires careful treatment, but it can certainly have a positive effect on many physiological functions, including sleep.
Testosterone
Testosterone, the primary male hormone, is responsible for regulating bone mass, fat distribution, muscle mass, strength, and the production of red blood cells and sperm in men. In women, it works alongside estrogen to regulate reproductive tissue.
In a recent study conducted by Dr. Eve Van Cauter of the University of Chicago, a link between testosterone production and sleep deprivation was noted. “As research progresses, low sleep duration and poor sleep quality are increasingly recognized as endocrine disruptors,” Van Cauter stated.
Some men have even reported improvements in sleep quality following testosterone replacement therapy!
Estrogen and Progesterone
These essential hormones are particularly important in female health and development. In women, they are responsible for regulating the menstrual cycle and developing secondary sexual characteristics such as breasts and endometrium. In males, they are responsible for the maturation of sperm cells and the maintenance of a healthy libido.
Estrogen and progesterone have the potential to impact sleep throughout your life, but especially as it pertains to sexual development. During pregnancy, these hormonal changes support a growing fetus, but can also significantly affect sleep.
The greatest risk of hormone-related sleep disruption, however, typically occurs during perimenopause and menopause. While this alone can affect sleepiness, it can also cause symptoms such as hot flashes and night sweats which can also drastically affect your sleep.
At Renewed Vitality, we specialize in estrogen and other hormone replacement therapy. This can help rebalance your hormones, thereby eliminating symptoms of perimenopause and menopause that can compromise sleep.
Over the years, we’ve studied hormonal imbalance in many different forms, and we’ve worked alongside the medical community to develop many different treatments that can keep your body’s vital chemistry in-line.
For more information on Renewed Vitality and what we could do to help, don’t hesitate to contact us today. We look forward to helping you get back on track!
When it comes to non-traditional approaches to medicine and wellness, there are always those who are quick to dispute their effectiveness. Unfortunately, Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) is one form of treatment that often falls into this category.
Talking to friends, family, or conducting your own research online may result in conflicting information regarding HRT, and this mixture of information can overcomplicate things, making it challenging to separate fact and fiction.
At Renewed Vitality, we are the Reading, PA area’s main HRT resource. Over the course of several years, we have practiced integrative medicine and focused on natural treatment options. In that time, we have come across (and successfully debunked) a number of common myths surrounding HRT.
For your benefit, we have compiled five of them right here. Take a look below, and then be sure to discuss your options with your doctor to see if Hormone Replacement Therapy from Renewed Vitality may be an option for you.
Myth #1: HRT Only Works for Women
Perhaps due to its significant benefits for both Perimenopausal and Menopausal women, there is a common myth that Hormone Replacement Therapy only works for women. In reality, this couldn’t be further from the truth.
Just as women seek HRT to treat menopausal symptoms, men too can address their hormonal imbalances. One important male hormone that can fall out of balance with age is testosterone.
Low testosterone can lead to symptoms like low libido, fatigue, weight fluctuations, and more. There is evidence that HRT can effectively manage these issues in men just as well as they can manage hormone imbalances in women.
Myth #2: HRT Causes Cancer and Heart Disease
This myth and others like it are mostly based on outdated, logically flawed studies that have disproven time and time again.
Original research that discussed HRT and its supposed link to cancer was inherently flawed, and other researchers have gone back to this study and debunked this unfortunate myth.
Although it’s true that receiving more hormones than your body requires can raise the risk of certain types of cancers, properly conducted HRT itself doesn’t cause cancer. Furthermore, HRT does not cause cancer in healthy adults with no history of hormone-sensitive cancer.
When it comes to heart disease, there is even less evidence that this is the case. Recent studies have reported no such association between HRT and heart disease. In fact, studies have found that women taking estrogen-only HRT were actually less likely to develop heart disease.
Myth #3: HRT is Only Beneficial for Severe Symptoms
For some reason, there is a persistent myth that HRT should only be used to address severe symptoms of hormone imbalance. The truth is, you don’t need to wait for your symptoms to get worse before seeking assistance.
HRT can be beneficial even for less severe symptoms that may be having a negative effect on your daily life. These symptoms can include things like hot flashes, night sweats, irritability, and more.
The reality is, if you are experiencing symptoms that may be related to hormone imbalance, there is no such thing as seeking out treatment too early.
Myth #4: There’s Only One Form of HRT
Trying to properly envision hormone replacement therapy treatments can be a challenge if you don’t know what to expect, and many people seem to believe that there is only one way to administer HRT. The truth however, is much less restrictive.
You may be surprised to know that there are several types of HRT, and these types can range from oral to topical formulations. In fact, different types of HRT can be used both alone or in specific combinations in order to best treat your symptoms and balance your hormones.
Myth #5: HRT is Not “Natural”
All bioidentical hormones, even those that are derived from plants, require a chemical process that helps pharmacists synthesize the final product. However, did you know that bioidentical hormones contain an exact molecular match of the human hormone? It’s true!
Whether you’re talking about creams, patches, injections, or pellets, every bioidentical hormone is made up of the most natural form of hormones you can find.
To learn more about HRT and how it may be able to benefit you, don’t hesitate to contact Renewed Vitality today! We’re always accepting new patients!
