Michael Buffton

Treating Menopause With Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy

This article is about treating menopause with Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy, specifically the differences between BHRT and standard hormone replacement therapy (HRT). It discusses nature of BHRT and the side-effects from both BHRT and HRT.

Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy (BHRT) has been proposed as a good alternative to Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT). Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy is primarily used in the treatment of menopause in women. Because the therapy is prescribed and implemented under the guidance of one's personal physician, the specific combination of hormones in BHRT are specifically catered to every individual patient.

When a physician feels his or her patient can benefit from Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy, the doctor prescribes specialized medications containing estrogen, progesterone, or other hormones that are exact chemical duplicates of hormones produced by women, primarily in the ovaries. Some patients today hold the opinion that all drugs used in hormone replacement therapies expose menopausal women to unnecessary side-effects. However, this is not true. Because they are identical to the hormones that are present naturally in the human body, treatments that effectively balance their levels in women can have countless beneficial effects, both physically and psychologically.

Menopause is the reproductive change in women past a particular age- the onset of which differs from culture to culture, depending on factors such as dietary practices, stress levels, and genetics. During the process of menopause, women have progressively less frequent periods, eventually stopping altogether in the later stages. Aside from rare cases, menopause is a natural effect of the aging cycle, usually beginning after the age of 45. Menopause occurs because the woman's ovary stops producing estrogen and progesterone, which are the hormones that regulate the female menstrual cycle. Various symptoms associated with menopause are hot flashes, night sweats, trouble sleeping, vaginal dryness, mood swings, trouble focusing, and decreased sex drive. Many of these symptoms can be alleviated with treatment that combines lifestyle changes with clinically-proven hormone replacement therapies such as Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy.

Aside from providing relief from the extremes of the unpleasant effects experienced by women during menopause, BHRT has also been shown to prevent or treat conditions such as osteoporosis that can have adverse effects on a woman's health. The estrogen and progesterone related symptoms of menopause are significantly lower after administering BHRT in pre-menopausal and menopausal women. Perhaps the greatest advantage of bio-identical treatments to standard hormone replacement therapies is that they have been shown to cause significantly less side-effects that can take away from the comfort and productivity of a patient's day-to-day life. When compared with HRT, BHRT patients demonstrate less undesirable responses such as decreased energy, weight gain, and propensity for mental effects such as depression or increased anxiety. Since Bio-Identical Hormone Replacement Therapy employs more natural treatments than its counterpart, the new therapy is more in-tune with intricate design of the human body. By ensuring a healthier balance of the naturally-occurring hormones in the body, BHRT is a more comprehensive approach to treating menopause which focuses on the unique relationship between the physical, psychological, and environmental factors that affect the female life-cycle.  

In conclusion, Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy has been approved by many physicians and health-care associations as a viable means of treating hormone-related menopausal symptoms in women. More importantly, since menopause often causes negative side-effects such as weight gain, decreased sex drive, and psychological disorders, the use of BHRT can drastically help prevent these from taking away from a woman's quality of life. The amount of weight gained and instances of depression or increased anxiety experienced by pre-menopausal and menopausal women who undergo BHRT is much less than women who are administered HRT or women who are not opting for any form of menopause symptom alleviating therapy.

Article Tags: Bioidentical Hormone Replacement, Hormone Replacement Therapy, Hormone Replacement Therapies, Treating Menopause, Bioidentical Hormone, Hormone Replacement, Replacement Therapy, Replacement Therapies

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