I remember clearly this debacle and the overnight fear that enveloped my patients on HRT.. I had a hard time even then accepting that study because with my small brain and basic " country doc knowledge " I could see the flaws.. I cautioned my patients and let them choose based on risk/ benefit. Never saw any rise in the touted side effects listed in this wretched study.. Clinical experience and anecdotal evidence speaks for itself.. sadly a whole generation has lost this benefit and current physicians are still behind in knowledge. Most patients are way more educated on this topic than their PCP/GYN!!
Edited to add: one key point is now I am a little worried the pendulum may shift too far the other way, almost akin to the days of " nursing shaming " . Social media influencers and famed gynecologists on social media are now preaching HRT benefits from the rooftops and extrapolating almost guaranteed health benefits in multiple health dark horses .. the fact is HRT has been studied less in women than the animal/ good industry and now as being sold as the new wonder drug for all. It's definitely not the answer for everyone and many choose not to use it or have genetic issues and conditions that make it intolerable. More studies are needed but caution needs to be heeded so we don't make false promises or misinform or shame those for whom HRT causes more issues than helps.
Delighted to see you report on clinical experience. Ray Peat as you likely recall was one of the first to show the difference between natural (bio identical) progesterone and
the much touted Premarin. As you point out a clinicians experience (just the facts)
reveal the truth.
Your last statement concerning lay peoples education is prescient.
I'd like to address to you a question I asked earlier in this thread. What do you think about estrogen blockers as a prophylactic treatment for breast cancer after surgery and radiation?
That's a huge question that has many variables. In fact we did an interview with Dr Kelly Victory on this very topic where she shared her personal decision making on breast cancer therapy. We are not Oncologists nor studied all the data on it. However like everything else in medicine, some drugs may be helpful in one situation, more harmful than beneficial in another. Every medical decision depends on risk and benefit: ie SERMS for a lifetime in a 30 year old has much more potential for long term negative side effects than in a 70 + year old with shorter lifespan. The grade of tumor also matters as well.. CIS vs Grade 3 presents different odds for recurrence and warrants different risk/ benefit thought processes..
One must consider other factors : Estrogen receptor status, personal response to estrogen, bone density, family history, personal health history, habits and lifestyle.. all these and more matter . You need a GOOD physician who will be honest about the potential helpful benefit of the chemo agent but especially the side effects and impact on quality of life.
You are pointing out that the Medical cartel in alignment with Big P and the Insurance Cartel dis allow and thus control "your" health. It has never been different since the Flexner Report.
I suffered through a decade of severe hot flashes, insomnia, etc. Tried every natural remedy i could find and nothing helped. I was bound and determined to not take any prescription drugs. This year at 67 my naturopath recommended bioidentical hormones. My body felt like it was shutting down. Insomnia, constipation, fatigue, brain fog, etc. I have always been a fit, high energy person. I got out of my own way and tried the bioidentical hormones. A life changer for me.
Kyra, I’m 65 & want to start Bioidenticals but risk of cardiac issues make me wary. What can you share on that? Is it estradiol or estriol? You give me hope!! Also, NY is awful with anything that actually helps so I may need to go outside of my state. So corrupt.
I recommend seeing a naturopath that specializes in bioidentical hormone replacement to get all your questions answered. I use a transdermal estradiol, estriol and testosterone cream. Also take progesterone at night and a low dose thyroid (my level is low). It took a few months to get the dosage just right. I wish you all the best in finding the right doctor.
Note to all women taking Thyroid replacement: It's almost always best to take it in the AM and to have nothing but water, black tea or black coffee for one hour after. Also, talk to your doctor about natural thyroid meds too. Many humans cannot synthesize the synthetic versions.
I will look outside of NY -naturopaths and integrative medical practitioners(good ones) are quite difficult to find due to capture of medicine in the state. Thank you!
Dong Quai relieved hot flashes for me in the eighties...took four capsules and in ten minutes no symptoms...old Chinese tradition...no chemicals from human factories...
Note to females; Please be sure to check with your doctor before you take Dong Quai, Evening Primrose, Black Cohosh and other herbs for menopausal symptoms. Some of these actually reverse menopause (!) by starting monthly cycles again, even if they've been naturally stopped for years! All herbs are not innocent.
My health insurance stopped covering bioidentical hormones. They work well and I'm continuing to take them, but they are very expensive and I have to pay out of pocket. What can MAHA do to get Scroogey HMOs to cover this?
Big Pharma is to blame both for removing insurance coverage for bioidentical hormones and for their never ending fight to make them illegal. Don't expect to get insurance coverage back. Just be thankful bioidentical hormones are still legal.
Good question. Are you suggesting that the Gubmint is responsible for your prescriptive health? If the cost came way down it would be a non issue. That the way forward.
Independence is best! I stay out of "the system" whenever possible because it can easily trap you and collect too much information for manipulation by Ai. We need to return to the limits on government envisioned by our country's founding fathers (but that ship sailed well over a century ago).
The truth is George Bush Senior was on the Lilly Board of Directors and got NIH to spend $30 million dollars on the WHI research which was pre designed to discredit estrogen and push Lilly's osteoporosis chemo drug that destroys the body's ability to destroy old bone. Had nothing to do about good medicine.
Finally we're seeing some corection of the damage done by that 2002 study. The timing hypothesis makes so much sense when you think about it. Women in their late 60s and 70s should have never been the test group for menopausal hormone therapy. What's encouraging is that HHS is willing to admit when prevous guidance was wrong and actually do something about it. This could improve quality of life for so many woman going forward.
Mis information is deliberate as it produces false beliefs. Studies in peer review journals have been consistently exposed as Pay to Play schemes. For at least 15 years it has improved quality of life for BOTH genders with knowledge and expertise.
What should really be looked at are the natural, non-synthetic, herbal treatments and protocols of Maharishi Ayurveda. Totally safe and far more effective. These are time- tested for thousands of years. When I started to have hot flashes I was prescribed an herbal preparation and within 2 weeks the hot flashes ended - permanently! When the body is in balance all those other chronic "diseases" do not occur as much or at all.
Not sure if this appropriate (as I'm a veterinarian), but a phytoestrogenic herbal mix I use to bring dairy cows into estrus works quite well. I've been using it as a clinician for the last 20 years in cases where there has been no visible signs of estrus (but nothing g else is wrong). Ingredients: Angelica sp., Dioscorea sp.., Linum sp., Mitchella sp., Oenothera sp., Turnera sp., Viburnum sp. (Dong quai, wild yam, squaw vine, black haw, flax). It's based on a human formula I modified. That human formula is no longer manufactured.
I would strongly recommend herbal hormones with balanced action over synthetic hormones that have isolated, unopposed action.
When I was in my 40s in the 1990s a friend if mine who was a PA was insistent that I start hormone replacement. The fact that I never had any negative symptoms then or later as I actually experienced menopause didn't matter to him. How about each woman decide for herself what she needs.
Am I in Bizarro world? Generally speaking, we want to see stuff pulled of the market and push back on pharma not promote it. Since we need to negoiate with the devil I guess, what small bread crumb do we the people get for removing a "black box"? This show is a scam, and I feel like MAHA is starting to participate in it. I'm furious and just about off the bandwagon.
Only a compounding pharmacy (not Big Pharma) makes bioidentical hormones (the safe hormones). Big Pharma only makes the synthetic (non-bioidentical hormones) which are NOT safe. Big Pharma goes to great lengths to make bioidentical hormones illegal and fortunately has failed, so far. Bioidentical hormones greatly cut into Pharma's future profits from drugs designed to fix problems Pharma drugs create.
My wife and I both get bioidentical hormone cream (complete with no more hormones needed) for only $110 (for each one of us), for a 90-day supply from a compounding pharmacy. I don't consider that expensive.
Ted that is not true. Over the counter Bio Identical Progesterone has been widely available. None the less a massive push to outlaw Compounding Pharmacies has been ongoing for a very long time. Sen Durban is one of the worst.
Any ongoing competition (including very expensive compounding Pharms) is attacked.
In the late 1970's I worked in a cancer research lab specializing in hormone dependent cancers (breast and testicular). Our lab tested tissue samples for 5-states in the Pacific Northwest for doctors needing to know if their cancerous tissue would respond to hormone therapy. Strangely, tumors dependant on hormones regressed when the hormone supply way INCREASED and also when it was DECREASED. So the tumors receeded when hormone levels were outside of the tumor's range needed for survival.
Availability … NOT! Everyone who doesn't get digital ID’s and use digital currency will be TOTALLY locked out of regular society. Big $$$$$ controls the world and will very soon lock everything down (e.g., creating scarsities, enforcing controls, plus total surveillance just like China). Only people who choose to remain independent of these two will buy MORE time to stay uncaptured by the system. Avoiding the use of digital ID’s and use digital currency appears to be nearly impossible in the long term.
Wow. That's extremely interesting. Not that I would make a decision based solely on this information (don't worry), but that suggests that if I took estrogen, that would also prevent proliferation of cancer cells. Right now, the treatment I'm on is prophylactic. I had surgery and radiation; no chemo because of a low oncotype number.
You MUST take both progesterone and estrogen and not just one of these to be hormonally balanced. Otherwise, you will feel terrible and be unhealthy. Find a knowledgeable naturopathic physician specializing in hormone replacement therapy to balance your hormone levels.
The name "bioidentical hormones" wouldn't be allowed by Big Pharma if this form of hormones wasn't truly bioidentical to the human body. Big Pharma has gone to great lengths to eliminate all competition. They would also challenge this name in court and call it false advertising if they weren't truly "bioidentical". How could replacing natural hormones with bioidentical ones possibly be bad when correct hormone levels are required for good health?
Regarding experts, big money will buy you whatever you want. There are many scientists willing to take big money (which comes with biased goals) because that's the only way they can pursue their passions for their research. Funding for expensive health research only comes from rich and powerful sources that demand a good return on their investments (i.e., more $$$ and power). The only scientists that can be trusted are those who do unbiased research (i.e., those who not bought and paid for and those not pressured into justifying predetermined research outcomes). The big challenge is to figure out which research experts do unbiased studies that follow true scientific methods.
I remember clearly this debacle and the overnight fear that enveloped my patients on HRT.. I had a hard time even then accepting that study because with my small brain and basic " country doc knowledge " I could see the flaws.. I cautioned my patients and let them choose based on risk/ benefit. Never saw any rise in the touted side effects listed in this wretched study.. Clinical experience and anecdotal evidence speaks for itself.. sadly a whole generation has lost this benefit and current physicians are still behind in knowledge. Most patients are way more educated on this topic than their PCP/GYN!!
Edited to add: one key point is now I am a little worried the pendulum may shift too far the other way, almost akin to the days of " nursing shaming " . Social media influencers and famed gynecologists on social media are now preaching HRT benefits from the rooftops and extrapolating almost guaranteed health benefits in multiple health dark horses .. the fact is HRT has been studied less in women than the animal/ good industry and now as being sold as the new wonder drug for all. It's definitely not the answer for everyone and many choose not to use it or have genetic issues and conditions that make it intolerable. More studies are needed but caution needs to be heeded so we don't make false promises or misinform or shame those for whom HRT causes more issues than helps.
Delighted to see you report on clinical experience. Ray Peat as you likely recall was one of the first to show the difference between natural (bio identical) progesterone and
the much touted Premarin. As you point out a clinicians experience (just the facts)
reveal the truth.
Your last statement concerning lay peoples education is prescient.
I'd like to address to you a question I asked earlier in this thread. What do you think about estrogen blockers as a prophylactic treatment for breast cancer after surgery and radiation?
That's a huge question that has many variables. In fact we did an interview with Dr Kelly Victory on this very topic where she shared her personal decision making on breast cancer therapy. We are not Oncologists nor studied all the data on it. However like everything else in medicine, some drugs may be helpful in one situation, more harmful than beneficial in another. Every medical decision depends on risk and benefit: ie SERMS for a lifetime in a 30 year old has much more potential for long term negative side effects than in a 70 + year old with shorter lifespan. The grade of tumor also matters as well.. CIS vs Grade 3 presents different odds for recurrence and warrants different risk/ benefit thought processes..
One must consider other factors : Estrogen receptor status, personal response to estrogen, bone density, family history, personal health history, habits and lifestyle.. all these and more matter . You need a GOOD physician who will be honest about the potential helpful benefit of the chemo agent but especially the side effects and impact on quality of life.
Medicare and my supplemental won't cover bioidentical only synthetic hormones, hopefully this will change.
You are pointing out that the Medical cartel in alignment with Big P and the Insurance Cartel dis allow and thus control "your" health. It has never been different since the Flexner Report.
I have been off Estradiol for about 10 years, but it was always extremely cheap, like $10. You might want to ask about cost without insurance.
I think that is the synthetic version. I get my bioidenticals from a compound pharmacy.
I suffered through a decade of severe hot flashes, insomnia, etc. Tried every natural remedy i could find and nothing helped. I was bound and determined to not take any prescription drugs. This year at 67 my naturopath recommended bioidentical hormones. My body felt like it was shutting down. Insomnia, constipation, fatigue, brain fog, etc. I have always been a fit, high energy person. I got out of my own way and tried the bioidentical hormones. A life changer for me.
Kyra, I’m 65 & want to start Bioidenticals but risk of cardiac issues make me wary. What can you share on that? Is it estradiol or estriol? You give me hope!! Also, NY is awful with anything that actually helps so I may need to go outside of my state. So corrupt.
I recommend seeing a naturopath that specializes in bioidentical hormone replacement to get all your questions answered. I use a transdermal estradiol, estriol and testosterone cream. Also take progesterone at night and a low dose thyroid (my level is low). It took a few months to get the dosage just right. I wish you all the best in finding the right doctor.
Excellent advice, there are MD's that call themselves Integrative that can also assist. A small % of chiropractors also have adequate knowledge.
Dr. Yoho wrote an excellent treatise on the topic, one of many.
Yes thank you. It’s a full time job in NY finding those outside of the standard allopathic model! & chiros in NY cannot prescribe.
Note to all women taking Thyroid replacement: It's almost always best to take it in the AM and to have nothing but water, black tea or black coffee for one hour after. Also, talk to your doctor about natural thyroid meds too. Many humans cannot synthesize the synthetic versions.
I agree.
I will look outside of NY -naturopaths and integrative medical practitioners(good ones) are quite difficult to find due to capture of medicine in the state. Thank you!
Thanks so MUCH for sharing! Is the plan for you continue on this approach indefinitely?
Yes, I believe so.
Dong Quai relieved hot flashes for me in the eighties...took four capsules and in ten minutes no symptoms...old Chinese tradition...no chemicals from human factories...
Note to females; Please be sure to check with your doctor before you take Dong Quai, Evening Primrose, Black Cohosh and other herbs for menopausal symptoms. Some of these actually reverse menopause (!) by starting monthly cycles again, even if they've been naturally stopped for years! All herbs are not innocent.
the next question: is there any benefit to starting HRT after menopause? many of the symptoms atributed to menopause continue after the hot flashes.
Start HRT NOW and GREATLY improve your quality of life immediately. Recommendation: use cream version made by compounding pharmacy.
ah the debate concerning bio availability
Transdermal delivery using micronized hormone works a charm for Progesterone.
Unfortunately it many not hold true of other hormones or their precursors.
No injections with self-assembling nanobots for me! Every study I see of injectibles shows their presence, even before the year 2000 in some samples.
My health insurance stopped covering bioidentical hormones. They work well and I'm continuing to take them, but they are very expensive and I have to pay out of pocket. What can MAHA do to get Scroogey HMOs to cover this?
Big Pharma is to blame both for removing insurance coverage for bioidentical hormones and for their never ending fight to make them illegal. Don't expect to get insurance coverage back. Just be thankful bioidentical hormones are still legal.
Good question. Are you suggesting that the Gubmint is responsible for your prescriptive health? If the cost came way down it would be a non issue. That the way forward.
Independence is best! I stay out of "the system" whenever possible because it can easily trap you and collect too much information for manipulation by Ai. We need to return to the limits on government envisioned by our country's founding fathers (but that ship sailed well over a century ago).
The truth is George Bush Senior was on the Lilly Board of Directors and got NIH to spend $30 million dollars on the WHI research which was pre designed to discredit estrogen and push Lilly's osteoporosis chemo drug that destroys the body's ability to destroy old bone. Had nothing to do about good medicine.
Finally we're seeing some corection of the damage done by that 2002 study. The timing hypothesis makes so much sense when you think about it. Women in their late 60s and 70s should have never been the test group for menopausal hormone therapy. What's encouraging is that HHS is willing to admit when prevous guidance was wrong and actually do something about it. This could improve quality of life for so many woman going forward.
Mis information is deliberate as it produces false beliefs. Studies in peer review journals have been consistently exposed as Pay to Play schemes. For at least 15 years it has improved quality of life for BOTH genders with knowledge and expertise.
What should really be looked at are the natural, non-synthetic, herbal treatments and protocols of Maharishi Ayurveda. Totally safe and far more effective. These are time- tested for thousands of years. When I started to have hot flashes I was prescribed an herbal preparation and within 2 weeks the hot flashes ended - permanently! When the body is in balance all those other chronic "diseases" do not occur as much or at all.
Not sure if this appropriate (as I'm a veterinarian), but a phytoestrogenic herbal mix I use to bring dairy cows into estrus works quite well. I've been using it as a clinician for the last 20 years in cases where there has been no visible signs of estrus (but nothing g else is wrong). Ingredients: Angelica sp., Dioscorea sp.., Linum sp., Mitchella sp., Oenothera sp., Turnera sp., Viburnum sp. (Dong quai, wild yam, squaw vine, black haw, flax). It's based on a human formula I modified. That human formula is no longer manufactured.
I would strongly recommend herbal hormones with balanced action over synthetic hormones that have isolated, unopposed action.
When I was in my 40s in the 1990s a friend if mine who was a PA was insistent that I start hormone replacement. The fact that I never had any negative symptoms then or later as I actually experienced menopause didn't matter to him. How about each woman decide for herself what she needs.
Am I in Bizarro world? Generally speaking, we want to see stuff pulled of the market and push back on pharma not promote it. Since we need to negoiate with the devil I guess, what small bread crumb do we the people get for removing a "black box"? This show is a scam, and I feel like MAHA is starting to participate in it. I'm furious and just about off the bandwagon.
Delete your fury. Generalizations are not useful forthe topic of Hormone replacement.
Specific knowledge is crucial. Takes vision to see the end game, and accurate assessment.
I, too, am leary of anything promoted by the medical field….😒
Only a compounding pharmacy (not Big Pharma) makes bioidentical hormones (the safe hormones). Big Pharma only makes the synthetic (non-bioidentical hormones) which are NOT safe. Big Pharma goes to great lengths to make bioidentical hormones illegal and fortunately has failed, so far. Bioidentical hormones greatly cut into Pharma's future profits from drugs designed to fix problems Pharma drugs create.
They do make bioidentical hormones that are by prescription now. They’re still very expensive.
My wife and I both get bioidentical hormone cream (complete with no more hormones needed) for only $110 (for each one of us), for a 90-day supply from a compounding pharmacy. I don't consider that expensive.
Ted that is not true. Over the counter Bio Identical Progesterone has been widely available. None the less a massive push to outlaw Compounding Pharmacies has been ongoing for a very long time. Sen Durban is one of the worst.
Any ongoing competition (including very expensive compounding Pharms) is attacked.
Can someone tell me if this affects thinking on estrogen blockers as a treatment for estrogen receptor positive breast tumors?
In the late 1970's I worked in a cancer research lab specializing in hormone dependent cancers (breast and testicular). Our lab tested tissue samples for 5-states in the Pacific Northwest for doctors needing to know if their cancerous tissue would respond to hormone therapy. Strangely, tumors dependant on hormones regressed when the hormone supply way INCREASED and also when it was DECREASED. So the tumors receeded when hormone levels were outside of the tumor's range needed for survival.
Ted you were "educated" to believe the two malignancies were Hormone mediated.
As you discovered that is the lie currently being exposed.
We will witness a huge surge and demand in affordable Bio Identicals including Testosterone.
Availability … NOT! Everyone who doesn't get digital ID’s and use digital currency will be TOTALLY locked out of regular society. Big $$$$$ controls the world and will very soon lock everything down (e.g., creating scarsities, enforcing controls, plus total surveillance just like China). Only people who choose to remain independent of these two will buy MORE time to stay uncaptured by the system. Avoiding the use of digital ID’s and use digital currency appears to be nearly impossible in the long term.
Wow. That's extremely interesting. Not that I would make a decision based solely on this information (don't worry), but that suggests that if I took estrogen, that would also prevent proliferation of cancer cells. Right now, the treatment I'm on is prophylactic. I had surgery and radiation; no chemo because of a low oncotype number.
You MUST take both progesterone and estrogen and not just one of these to be hormonally balanced. Otherwise, you will feel terrible and be unhealthy. Find a knowledgeable naturopathic physician specializing in hormone replacement therapy to balance your hormone levels.
Thank you. I appreciate your taking the time to respond! I'll look into this.
I heard that it can be positive, nor harmful, but you will need to get an expert opinion
The name "bioidentical hormones" wouldn't be allowed by Big Pharma if this form of hormones wasn't truly bioidentical to the human body. Big Pharma has gone to great lengths to eliminate all competition. They would also challenge this name in court and call it false advertising if they weren't truly "bioidentical". How could replacing natural hormones with bioidentical ones possibly be bad when correct hormone levels are required for good health?
Regarding experts, big money will buy you whatever you want. There are many scientists willing to take big money (which comes with biased goals) because that's the only way they can pursue their passions for their research. Funding for expensive health research only comes from rich and powerful sources that demand a good return on their investments (i.e., more $$$ and power). The only scientists that can be trusted are those who do unbiased research (i.e., those who not bought and paid for and those not pressured into justifying predetermined research outcomes). The big challenge is to figure out which research experts do unbiased studies that follow true scientific methods.
People hear lots of things. That creates con-fusion. All by design.
Expertise is eqivalent to knowledge. The problem is the best educated are the most
indoctrinated. There is already great advice in this comment section.
I’ve been using bioidenticals for years. Impossible for my bone health and so much else. 👍
Herbs worked very well for my symptoms and did not require a prescription.
What about birth control pills?