Tag : estrogen : Page 2

Some patients get upset if I will not accept, on faith, that their latest homeopathic, holistic, ionized, wheat grass remedy (you get the idea) was unlikely to cure their arthritis. Many years ago I accepted the fact that there are many things I do not, and probably never will, know.  But I like to think I know SOMETHING.

I think the perception that we doctors don’t know anything derives from how often patients get told crazy, conflicting health advice. Consider a man who was born in 1949 who would be about 60 now. In his lifetime, he would have seen doctors talk about which brand of cigarettes had the greatest health benefits and that a hearty breakfast of bacon and eggs was healthy. However, he would also remember being told that the cholesterol in eggs and bacon would kill him but then he’d recall being told that maybe it wasn’t as bad as we originally thought. More recently, he has probably heard that there is good and bad cholesterol and he needs to get

I came across a news item the other day that irritated me. It was another one of those stories about how dangerous estrogen therapy is for post-menopausal women. It contained the usual tsking and finger-wagging over doctors who felt it necessary to interfere with the ‘natural process of aging and menopause’ and the horrible risks of cancer they cause while doing it.

There’s so much wrong with that position I scarcely know where to begin. First off, we scarcely need to discuss my opinion of the ‘the natural process of aging’. Suffice it to say, the natural process of aging is one of slow decline into a pitiable, crippled, wretched shell of a human being. My opinion: we don’t have to just give up like that.

The medical community started giving estrogen to post-menopausal women nearly 50 years ago for excellent reasons. Without it the health and quality of life of post-menopausal women was declining so precipitously, it became apparent that