New Treatment To Fight The Effects Of Menopause

Image by tejamen1947 via FlickrIt's being touted as the fountain of youth for menopausal women. It's called bio-identical hormone therapy. The treatment has been so successful women are flying from as far away as Australia to get the treatments they describe as life changing.

A few of the symptoms of menopause are diminished sex drive, thickening waistline, lack of energy and headaches.

"My whole body went into chaos and nobody could tell me why. I was constantly having hot flashes and night sweats." said Jennifer Crowe

Jennifer Crowe's worst symptoms after a hysterectomy were migraines . They got so bad she often found herself in the emergency room. That's when she turned to her gynecologist, Dr. Kathy Maupin, who started her on bio-identical hormones. Every 3 to 4 months she has tiny hormone pellets implanted into her hip area. Jennifer says the pellets have changed her life.

Because the hormones are implanted in pellets they provide a more even level of hormones in the blood. In contrast to oral pills, they avoid what's called the first pass effect.

"It doesn't go through your liver and get changed into products that are detrimental and cause risks for breast cancer and heart disease." said Dr. Maupin

Dr. Maupin became a believer in hormone pellet implants after her own hysterectomy. She says she was always tired, had horrible migraines and gained 20 lbs. The pellets, she says, made her feel normal again and she's thrilled to do the same for other women and also men.

In 2002 a study found that the use of hormone replacement therapy increased the risk for heart attacks, strokes and breast cancer but those were synthetic hormones. Bioidenticals are derived from soy and yam extracts and are structurally identical to the hormones found in a woman's body. The implants are not FDA approved. One pellet treament runs around $300.