Hormone Therapy for Women
Manage Menopause & Hormonal Imbalances with Hormone Replacement Therapy
At Family Weight & Wellness Clinic and Medi-Spa, our medical team specializes in hormone replacement therapy for women who are going through perimenopause, menopause, or other hormonal imbalance and want to manage their symptoms.
Anyone who has been through puberty understands that hormones have a significant effect on your body. Hormonal agents impact numerous aspects of your health, including your mood, your metabolism, and your reproductive and sexual functions.
If your hormones become unbalanced, you may notice typical signs of menopause and related hormonal conditions often connected to stress levels, poor nutrition, lack of regular activity, and the everyday direct exposure to environmental contaminants.
It is at such times that you may end up feeling like a stranger within your own skin. Nevertheless, compounded bioidentical hormone replacement therapy (BHRT), which is identical to the body's natural chemistry, is a way to bring back balance and help you feel like yourself again.
Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy for Women
BHRT for women often centers around three primary hormones: progesterone, testosterone, and three types of estrogen (estrone, estradiol, and estriol). All these hormones are very important to a woman's well-being.
Over time, hormones decrease at various rates. As they fall, women end up being more at risk for osteoporosis, heart disease, Alzheimer's disease, and stroke. Beginning hormone replacement therapy early in menopause offers protection against the start of these conditions, with several studies suggesting that lifelong usage of estradiol supplements can supply additional defense from depression and the aforementioned concerns.
Nevertheless, today many women in this country are estrogen dominant. They have very low levels of progesterone and testosterone with relatively high levels of estrogen. Often, this is triggered by the extra estrogen in their bodies from their diet as well as exposure to estrogen-like endocrine disrupting chemicals (EEDCs) within the environment.
These are chemicals that are absorbed and function like estrogen inside our bodies and include such things as the chemicals sprayed on our vegetables, flame retardants in some clothing, steroid-filled protein food sources, and even compounds in plastic bottled drinks. It is not surprising that most women are estrogen dominant.
Bioidentical hormones not only alleviate your symptoms of hormonal imbalance, but also safeguard you from osteoporosis and heart disease. The most efficient solution for any disease process is to prevent that disease in the first place. The goal to help you achieve optimal health is “hormonal balance.”
Other benefits of bioidentical hormone replacement therapy (BHRT) for women include:
- Decreases skin wrinkles
- Increases energy levels
- Eliminates night sweats and hot flashes
- Improves fat loss and muscle tone
- Improves mood, memory, and concentration
- Increases sex drive
- Prevents vaginal thinning and dryness
While BHRT is frequently recommended to alleviate the signs of menopause, it also can be used to treat a range of conditions that women of various ages might experience, often hormonally related, consisting of:
- Anxiety
- Brain fog
- Decreased libido
- Depression
- Endometriosis
- Fibrocystic breasts
- Fibroids
- Fluid retention
- Hair loss or unwanted growth
- Headaches/migraines
- Heavy periods without clotting
- Hot flashes
- Infertility
- Insomnia
- Irregular menstrual cycle
- Joint pain or stiffness
- Loss of energy or fatigue
- Menstrual cramps
- Memory loss
- Mood swings
- Night sweats
- Osteoporosis
- Ovarian cysts
- Pain in joints and/or weak muscles
- Panic attacks
- Painful sexual relations
- Postpartum depression
- Premenstrual syndrome (PMS)
- Reduced sexual desire and performance
- Sleep disturbances
- Thinning hair and pale skin
- Trouble sleeping
- Urinary dysfunction
- Vaginal dryness
- Weight gain (and inability to lose)
Commercial versus Custom-Compounded HRT
Literally millions of women struggle with hormonal imbalance, whether it is early menopause, perimenopause, perimenopause symptoms, perimenopause weight gain, adrenal fatigue, menopause, or premenstrual symptoms (PMS).
In many cases, bioidentical hormone treatment is the answer. As the number of women looking for hormone-related treatment has grown, so has the mass production of pills, patches, and creams by the pharmaceutical market.
Each woman's body is different and has its own unique needs. However, commercially produced products tend to be "one-size-fits-all," and do not consistently allow for the distinctions between individuals. No two women are alike, of course, and we understand this reality.
Pharmacy compounding is the art and science of preparing tailored medications for patients. The benefit of compounded BHRT is that it can be adjusted individually to fit each person's body and hormone levels.
BHRT can make use of hormonal agents that have the exact chemical structure as the hormones in the human body. The body recognizes them and allows them to imitate the function of the hormonal agents the body produces by itself.
Evaluating Your Hormone Levels
We will first provide a hormonal assessment questionnaire for you to complete. We then use a comprehensive hormone screen to determine which hormones your body is deficient in and which ones you have in excess. The hormonal agents we can evaluate are: estrone, estradiol, estriol, progesterone, DHEA, and testosterone.
We can also include a 4-point cortisol test to evaluate your adrenals, if adrenal fatigue is something of concern to you.
Dr. Richardson will analyze the results of hormone testing to determine your hormone levels, and then customize a medically supervised program just for you to correct hormonal levels with bioidentical hormones.
When you are evaluated for hormone levels, most labs look at whether you fall within a normal range. However, these ranges are not scaled based upon a person's age, race, sex, or other underlying medical factors. In other words, “normal” hormone levels are not the same as optimal levels. For that reason, commercial lab results most often are an incorrect representation of how well your hormones are functioning for you.
Our health professional team and you can use the results of these diagnostic tools to determine a course of treatment that will give you the precise level of hormones your body requires. Our objective is to get you to where you’re feeling significantly better, like you remember.
How Our Hormonal Restoration Plan Helps Women
Whether due to age or a hysterectomy, adrenal fatigue, or thyroid disorder, Family Weight & Wellness Clinic’s Hormonal Restoration Plan for women offers natural female hormonal agent replacement treatment to support those suffering from the symptoms of perimenopause and menopause.
Signs often first appear when estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone production start to decline (or become unbalanced), and these hormone imbalances can lead to chronic health issues and increase the danger of major illness.
We can help you begin and continue a hormone replacement program that brings your hormones back into balance and carefully simulates what your body has been doing naturally for years.
Hormonal preparations can be prescribed in a variety of strengths and dosage types, including:
- Capsules
- Rapid-dissolving tablets
- Sublingual drops or troches
- Suppositories
- Topical or vaginal gels and creams
Dr. Richardson will continue to communicate with you to make sure your BHRT is working properly, changing the dose if necessary, ensuring that the medications, supplements, and dietary support are truly optimized for your needs. This is how we are able to minimize the risks associated with HRT.
In addition to helping you feel your best, we make every effort to get you there quickly. Here are the treatment fundamentals we use to accomplish this with you:
Way of life modifications: Diet, sleep, daily activity, and other factors are vital to how you feel generally and will influence hormone levels and their balance. We guide you towards positive changes in these lifestyle areas.
Managing stress: A major enemy of optimum health is stress, and it will affect hormonal levels. We lay out pathways and recommendations to help you control it.
Nutritional supplements: Our bodies are biochemical organisms and what we put into them influences our hormone production and usage. We may (and often do) recommend specific supplements based upon your unique needs.
Compounded BHRT: We replace deficient hormones with bioidentical hormones compounded for your own unique needs.
While vitamins, diet, and exercise are important for overall health, natural hormone replacement and hormone therapy for women is the only therapy that can restore energy naturally, make you feel and function better mentally and physically, and provide long-term therapeutic protection.
It's your body...why not give yourself the benefit of a tailored, focused hormonal treatment regimen by Family Weight & Wellness Clinic and Medi-Spa? With our ongoing support, you can be healthier and look and feel younger than you have in years. To learn more about our hormone replacement therapy options for women, call today at (281) 292-2300 to schedule a consultation, or request an appointment online.
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