Bioidentical (or Natural) Hormone Therapy

Hormone Therapy (HT), commonly called Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT), is the expected therapy for women whose hormone levels have dropped, whether through the aging process or for some other reason, such as ovarian hysterectomy. As more and more women live longer, hormone therapy has become a way to extend a healthy vibrant life with strong healthy bones.

Natural Hormone Treatment

Women’s Health America, researchers, and healthcare providers use the terms “natural” and “bioidentical” to mean molecularly identical to the hormones produced in your body. Individualized, low-dose bioidentical hormone therapy is an alternative approach to synthetic hormone therapy. It uses what are called bioidentical (natural) hormones like estradiol, estriol, progesterone, cortisol, testosterone, and DHEA. The chemical structure of these hormones is exactly the same as the hormones produced naturally by a woman’s body.

A low-dose bioidentical hormone therapy prescription can be easily customized for each woman’s unique needs by qualified compounding pharmacies, those which make customized medications. Individualization includes testing a woman’s current hormone levels with a highly sensitive saliva test, determining the specific combination of hormones she requires, and prescribing at the lowest effective dose, thereby minimizing unwanted side-effects. These prescriptions can be administered in a variety of forms including tablets, capsules, patches, and creams. The ability to customize the strength as well as the dosage form is unique to compounding pharmacies and an option many women find appealing as it enables them to have their medication tailored to their individual needs and preferences.

Synthetic hormones are made in laboratories, en masse, and have a chemical structure similar, but not identical, to the hormones produced in a woman’s body. Because they are not identical, synthetic hormones cannot be counted on to act in the same way human hormones do. They may or may not produce the PMS, perimenopause, and menopause symptom control you desire. As these studies show, they may also produce potentially dangerous side effects such as an increased risk of heart attack, blood clots, stroke, and breast cancer. Furthermore, synthetic hormones are prescribed in a one-size-fits-all standard dose, not a low dose individualized for each woman. This “one-size-fits-all” approach increases the chance that the prescribed drug will produce unwanted and potentially dangerous side effects.

Bioidentical hormone therapy has been enhancing the quality of life for countless women, protecting many from chronic and debilitating disease for nearly thirty years. If your healthcare provider is not offering this choice to you, then it is up to you to take responsibility for educating yourself and your provider about this important option for healthy living and healthy aging – or to find another healthcare provider who is willing to listen and work with you.

Women’s Health America Offers Expert Help

With your prescribing healthcare provider, the expert pharmacists at Women’s Health America develop individualized treatment options from your self-assessment using noninvasive tests developed at Women’s Health America.

The consulting pharmacists at Madison Pharmacy Associates, of Women’s Health America, work with women and their healthcare providers to customize individualize low-dose natural hormone therapy regimens. Ask your healthcare provider to call 1-800-558-7046 for a comprehensive consultation with a pharmacist.

Women’s Health America is here to support you every step of the way.
Author and lecturer Christiane Northrup, MD, describes The HRT Solution as “the bible when it comes to hormone therapy.” Authors Marla Ahlgrimm, R.Ph., John M. Kells, and Christine Macgenn Rodgerson, wrote this highly informative book to end the confusion about Hormone Replacement Therapy.

Bioidentical Hormones Available through Women’s Health America

Women’s Health America’s family of companies offer a variety of options for taking hormones , and a variety of testing options. You can take hormones through your skin in gel, or cream form, whichever works best for you. A transdermal patch delivers continuous hormone therapy. Oral tablets for each hormone or combinations can be individually compounded for you.

The Restore® Program incorporates a simple, but very sensitive, saliva test to measure a baseline hormone profile for up to five hormones <link to definitions when they’re written>: estradiol, progesterone, testosterone, DHEA, and cortisol; and a urine NTx test to measure rate of bone loss. Follow-up testing is suggested at three months, and then annually (or as needed to affect the desired therapeutic outcome.) With a prescription from your healthcare provider, Restore Clinical Services will mail your home testing kit directly to you. In packaging we’ve provided, you send your samples directly to the Madison BioDiagnostics laboratory for testing. Samples are collected in the comfort of you own home. No needles required.

The natural hormones compounded individually by Madison Pharmacy Associates’ pharmacists are prescription medications, and are used successfully to manage symptoms of PMS, perimenopause, and menopause. Unlike synthetics such as Prempro®, bioidentical hormones are often better tolerated. And, because bioidentical hormones can be prescribed at low doses tailored to a women’s individual hormone levels, there can be maximum benefit with the lowest possible dose. Choosing among various low-dose estrogens is a decision best made by you and your healthcare provider based on the specific symptoms that need to be managed, and accurate test results.

Estrogens—The powerhouse of activity

You have estrogen receptors just about everywhere in your body. In fact, they are located throughout your brain, heart, blood vessels, bones, skin, intestines, and respiratory tract, as well as throughout your entire genitourinary (genital and urniary)system. They affect everything from the way your skin looks and feels to the way your heart beats.

Estradiol is the most active of the estrogens. It is mainly produced by the ovaries. As long as you are having menstrual cycles, it is your estradiol that is doing most of the ‘’estrogen work’’ that is going on in your body.

Estrone, another of the estrogens, is the one most commonly found in increased amounts in postmenopausal women. It is usually not necessary to replace Estrone, as the body naturally produces it through the metabolism of Estradiol and the body also derives it from hormones stored in your body fat. Estrone does the same work that estradiol does, but it is considered weaker in its effects.

Estriol, the weakest of the estrogens, is produced in large amounts in pregnant women. Women who are not pregnant have small amounts of estriol in their bodies.

Estriol may be the “weakest” of the estrogens, but that weakness may also be its strength, making it a good alternative to the more potent estradiol for managing menopausal symptoms. As a topical treatment for the skin, estriol has been used to manage the effects of aging and menopause. This includes not only anti-aging benefits like decreasing the appearance of facial wrinkles and firming skin, but also an assortment of benefits that stem from helping to maintain healthy skin in the vagina, cervix, vulva, and urethra.

Estradiol and estriol are the two bioidentical estrogens that Madison Pharmacy Associates compounds in a dosage to suit your needs.

Progesterone Not Just for Pregnancy

Progesterone makes pregnancy possible by preparing the lining of the uterus (endometrium) for the implanting of a fertilized egg. The hormone is important in bonebuilding, brain function, and as a hormone regulator. Progesterone can recognize when there is too much or too little of another hormone and can cascade, or transform, into DHEA, estrogen, testosterone, and cortisol. “Optimal levels of progesterone can mean feelings of calm and well-being, while low levels of that hormone can mean increased feelings of anxiety, irritability, and even anger.” (HRT Solution, p.41-42) Calming progesterone can control the excitable estrogens in some very important ways.

While synthetic progestins (like Provera®) are similar to the progesterone your body produces, their subtle chemical differences can significantly influence the hormone’s action and side effects in your body. Synthetic progestins can cause very unpleasant side-effects such as: irritability, nausea, depression, water retention, and others in women. Bioidentical progesterone is molecularly identical to the hormone made in your body, and many women find it easier to tolerate.

Madison Pharmacy Associates introduced an extended release progesterone tablet in 1986. This break-through progesterone delivery system combines a slow, even release of medication with the convenience of dosing once or twice daily. Tablets are individually compounded and dosed for each woman’s unique requirements. The pharmacists and nurses of Women’s Health America work with you and your healthcare providers to determine the appropriate dose for you.

A low-dose can go too low, which is why testing to establish baseline hormone levels, monitoring results, and re-testing is so important. A one-size-fits-all, low-dose prescription may be no more effective for an individual woman than a traditional one-size-fits-all high-dose prescription. The only way for you and your healthcare provider to know the right dose is to measure hormone levels before prescribing, and then again after hormone therapy has begun. When your healthcare provider knows your hormone profile, a customized, low-dose prescription using bioidentical hormones can be written for your unique needs.