About a generation ago, the best-se...

About a generation ago, the best-seller, Forever Feminine, through Robert A. Wilson, M.D., captured the immediate attention of menopausal women everywhere. The main division was revolutionary for that time, because it advocated that menopausal women take supplemental female hormones to deal with their many unpleasant symptoms which arose suitable to lost hormones when ovarian function slowed and eventually stopped. Menopause was then regarded as "a natural phase of aging," something in like manner common that most doctors commended that patients make "a exact mental adjustment to it" or that they pass it facing as "all in the mind."

Common real physical symptoms, in a certain combination, include: hot flashes, inordinate sweating, bone los (eventual "dowager's hump") sagging skin, water retention, vaginal drynes temper swings, and even heart disease.

Forever Feminine accented the positive aspects of estrogen replacement and gave little space to the long-term negative aspects: its apparent contribution to cancer of the cervix and, in any cases, of the breast. pretty soon when cancer of the cervix increased markedly, there was a backlash to the Wilson part and to strict hormone replacement.

Estrogen-progesterone therapy has negative side effects

Early in hormone therapy, menopausal women received alone estrogen. Then a new modality was recommended: the one and the other estrogen and progesterone. The latter hormone was said to in opposition to estrogen's influence on endometrial shooting changes in the mucous membrane lining the uterus.

Temporarily, this appear to beed to solve the problem to the satisfaction of orthodox doctors and their patients. However, other research then raised burning questions. Once-a-day estrogen-progresterone pills may cause the endometrium to thicken, predicts Kenneth A. Morhain, MD an obstetrician at Wright State University gymnasium of Medicine, based on a contemplation conducted by him and associates.

Although menstruating women evolve a similar endometrial thickening which morasss off during each menstrual revolution of time such an event normally doesn't happen in menopausal women. What is its significance? The researchers don't know besides and are disturbed.

Morhain and colleagues pored throughout the medical charts of 452 women treated daily with estrogen-progesterone for a minimum of three month The researchers concentrated particularly upon 32 women who experienced abnormal bleeding during therapy.

"Biopsies of their endometrial tissue showed an unexpect proliferation of small rooms in 22 of the women -- 69 percent" states an article in Science News

Remarking that the Morhain team's finding is "interesting," Dr Thomas E Nolan, of the Medical association of Georgia in Augusta, an authority forward menopause, reminds us that Morhain does not link the thickening to cancer.

However, until more research experiences conclusively that the endometrial solitary abode; squalid proliferation is harmless, he has change the direction ofed to a different regimen -- common that more closely resembles the natural cycle

One natural herbal relief to counteract menopausal symptoms already exists and its use is growing in popularity. It is based in succession black cohosh (a standardized extract from the rhizome of Cimicifuga racemosa, also called the "rattle weed").

Some healthcare practitioners, in Europe and in the U use it in conjunction with hormone replacement, while others use it in place of hormone replacement. Researcher E Liske construct this plant-based formula a worthwhile substitute for female hormones, in that it has "a mild estrogen-like action."

H Stolze, another researcher, reports succes with the black cohosh regimen for the entire range of menopausal symptoms mentioned earlier. Menopausal women received 40 small quantitys of black cohosh twice daily for six to eight weeks. Eighty percent of the women showed improvement of their symptoms after just four weeks. an of the women did flat better: reporting the complete disappearance of their symptoms.

Other studies repercussion of sound the Stolze findings. Researchers report no known negative side issues even in long-term therapy.

REFERENCES

"Menopausal Hormone Therapy: A modern Risk?" Science News, May 18 1991

Salaman, Maureen and Scheer, James F forages That Heal. Menlo Park, Calif.: Statford Publishing, 1989

Stolze, H Gynecology 1 14-16 (1982)

Robert A. Wilson, MD Feminine Forever (Hormone Therapy Aid to Vitality), main division condensation, Los Angeles Times, August 2 1966

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