Hormone Balancing

The problem is that there developed a suspicion that these benefits of HRT might not be as extensive as originally thought and the side effects might actually be greater than originally assessed. This rumbling of dissent about one of the cornerstones of modern medicine then grew into opening questioning of the wisdom of conventional HRT. Books like Lesley Kenton's "Passage to Power?(1996)" openly slated HRT and proposed natural Progesterone as the way forward. The concept of a possible male menopause and the importance of male prostate checks was the beginning of a general realization that balancing hormones might be something that we all need to consider and not something that is confined to women.

When a large study came out in 2004 showing that HRT was associated with breast cancer and increased cardiovascular risk, the floor was then open to reassess the entire concept of the benefits of hormone balancing in men and women using both natural and conventional hormones. The important point from this is that although we may have been doing our best, we need to be mindful that there is always a lot more to learn. What we do know is roughly the blood levels of hormones that we should have. I say roughly because a healthy body regulates our hormones a thousand times more specifically than we measure it or give it. Even our most advanced hormone replacers - insulin dependant diabetics, who inject a few units of insulin up to four times a day, are only roughly mimicking the precision that the pancreas shows when it alters the amount of insulin it releases every minute of the day. Unfortunately we are even worse at replacing the other hormones:

  • We give thyroid deficient patients the option of thyroxin tablets at 50 mg, 100mg or 150mg once a day! The tablets will be gradually released but this does not come close to how the thyroid gland fine-tunes the release of its own thyroxin.

  • Estrogens and progestogens that are taken in the contraceptive pill and HRT tablets are not even the same as the stuff that we secrete. They look similar but their difference means that when they lock in to a receptor site they will not always have the same reaction that our own hormone has!

    • However the good news is that we are realizing the importance of how our collection of hormones does actually interact. We also realize that these hormones decrease through life and that if one of them drops below a threshold, it can affect a multitude of other hormones causing a variety of symptoms. We know that if we replace the hormone then the symptoms should settle. If not then there often follows a spiral of fatigue, depression, premature aging and disease.

    What follows is a summary of what is coming out of this re-evaluation of this most important topic:

    1. We have multiple hormones in our bodies that all have important interactive functions.

    2. As we age we produce less and less of these hormones.

    3. Deficiencies of these hormones can cause fatigue, depression, sexual dysfunction, abdominal fat, weakened muscles, slower reaction times, visible signs of skin aging, weakened bones, weakened immunity, sugar imbalances, flushing and water retention.

    4. The major hormones involved in both men and women are: Human growth hormone (HGH), Progesterone, DHEA, Testosterone, Pregnenalone, Cortisol, and Melatonin. There are other hormones and brain chemicals that interact intimately with these seven major hormones.

    5. These seven hormones can all be monitored with blood tests and symptom scores and if low can be replaced.

    6. Initially they are best given as natural supplements or secretagogues. The body then changes these into the active hormone when the body needs it. Excess supplement is excreted and so will not cause any side-effects of excess hormone. For many people this is generally all that is required to get the blood levels back to youthful levels.

    7. If your hormone system is at a more resistant stage of failure then it may need the hormones to be injected directly into the body as the body is not managing to convert the supplement into the hormone. You would then give yourself a daily pinprick to restore your hormones back up to normal levels and not to excessive levels. As a result you should not experience any side-effects.

    8. Sportsmen have used hormones at ten times the levels of what we naturally have in our bodies and not surprisingly have had nasty side-effects with these powerful substances. Here we are only looking at replacing what has been lost.

    9. It is imperative to co-ordinate this with an anti-aging doctor who can monitor your symptoms, check your prostate blood levels and monitor your hormone blood levels. If this monitoring system shows that you are not getting benefits then we can advise an appropriate change.

    There are too many hormones to cover each one comprehensively here, but it is important to give an overview of how some of the interactions occur:

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