Hormone Replacement Bio-identical vs Analogue

During these ages, men and women experience decreased energy, decreased sense of well-being and a lack of desire for common daily activities. From a cosmetic point, patients report overnight loss of skin elasticity, loss of muscle tone, thinning hair and central body adiposity, or excess fat storage. Surprisingly, it’s been noted that if some of these patients are treated for specific hormonal deficiencies, the symptoms improve within 6-12 months. Although the medical community accepts this as a consequence of apoptosis (programmed cellular death), Eastern medicine and European medicine took a pro-active and practical approach. In the East, both Chinese and Indian (Ayurvedic) medicine note that supplementation with herbs and other extracts not only improve the symptoms of aging, but also reverse the decline and returned them to premenopausal levels of vitality, mental sharpness, and physical activity. The patients exhibited; less age related disease, decreased morbidity, less obesity, and the ability to maintain weight. Europeans took a more traditional approach looking into the use of chemically or naturally obtained hormonal replacements that were “bioidentical,” meaning they were exactly in the form of hormones found in the human body. What they found mirrored the Eastern results. Mainly, that supplementation improved stamina, decreased disease, maintained youthful weight and fat distribution, and patients reported a higher quality of life.

In the United Sates, hormones available for replacement used to be “bio-identical,” but the rise of the pharmaceutical industry grabbed control, claiming that they had a better way to handle this problem. Since bio-identical hormonal preparations could be compounded by any competent pharmacist, and could not be “Patented,” it comes as no surprise that the pharmaceutical industry developed hormonal “analogues” (chemical similar, but not identical to the hormones they replaced) which they convinced the American public worked just as well and were safer. The fact the analogues could be patented, their distribution controlled, and could be sold for 10 times the amount of their predecessors, insured that any information on economical bio-identical products would be suppressed.

History has borne out the fact that these analogue hormones are not optimal, can contribute to serious side effects, and may actually contribute to the rise in cancer in both men and women. Patients do not realize that there are physicians fully trained in bio-identical hormonal replacement which is customized, easily tolerated, and can be delivered in creams instead of pills. The internet has allowed unbiased information to be disseminated on the benefits of bio-identical hormones with celebrities like Oprah Winfrey, Donna Karan, and Suzanne Somers, joining the fight to educate the American and world public that aging and disintegration re not inevitable and can be markedly reduce with hormonal supplication. Further research need to be done, but it appears that bio-identical hormones carry virtually no side effect.

Vol 29 Issue 3 Page 22