Natural Menopausal Relief

By Bonnie Jenkins, Advanced Natural Medicine

As I was combing the news last week, I was saddened to learn of the death of Dr. John R. Lee. Last summer, I had the privilege of meeting Dr. Lee and hearing him lecture, and it was hard to believe that this brilliant and vibrant man was gone.

Dr. Lee died unexpectedly of a heart attack on Friday, October 17th. Up until that fateful day, he kept a busy schedule. At age 74, Dr. Lee continued to lecture and teach while writing his bestselling books (What Your Doctor May Not Tell You About Menopause and What Your Doctor May Not Tell You About Breast Cancer, among others) and monthly newsletters. In fact, he had recently returned from a speaking tour in Europe.

As I told you in the ANM bulletin “Boning up” (7/21/03), Dr. Lee pioneered the use of trandermal progesterone cream and the use of natural hormones for the symptoms of menopause. And, while he was championed by those of us in alternative health because he had the courage to stand up to the medical establishment’s dangerous and misguided use of synthetic HRT, modern medicine dismissed his recommendations for years.

Ahead of His Time

Dr. Lee left us a legacy of educating people about . He was the first to speak out on the dangers of HRT during a time when the risks weren’t publicized and doctors routinely prescribed synthetic hormones as a cure-all for menopause – as well as a way to prevent heart disease and osteoporosis.

Today, Dr. Lee’s warnings have been validated by study after study showing that HRT increases the risk of breast cancer, heart disease and dementia, as well as the risk of insulin resistance and Type II diabetes.

In his groundbreaking work, Dr. Lee found that estrogen, while highly touted, was the wrong hormone to give menopausal women. Instead of following the mainstream, he began recommending a transdermal progestone cream to his patients. Unlike the synthetic progesterone in many HRT formulas, natural progesterone is identical to the hormone made by the body. To his amazement, patients began reporting relief from hot flashes, night sweats and insomnia. Why? Because these women were suffering from estrogen dominance – not deficiency as their conventional doctors had been telling them!

Despite the naysayers, Dr. Lee never wavered from his unconventional approach to menopause and, in 1999, he was proven right. A randomized, placebo-controlled study of 102 women at St. Luke’s Hospital in Bethlehem, PA, found that boosting progesterone significantly improved the frequency of hot flashes. During the study, which appeared in the respected journal Obstetrics and Gynocology, the women applied a quarter teaspoon of either a natural progesterone cream or a placebo to their skin daily. After a year, the women using the progesterone cream reported an 83 percent improvement compared to only 19 percent in the placebo group.

But, as Dr. Lee discovered, progesterone isn’t just good for hot flashes. Natural progesterone also gives you more energy, promotes more restful sleep, and boosts concentration and digestion.

Further study convinced Dr. Lee that progesterone also had a positive effect on bone health and he began to get bone density tests for his patients using progesterone. Within a few years he realized that these women were gaining significant bone density - particularly those with the worst bone density to begin with. In one three year study of 63 postmenopausal women with osteoporosis, those using a transdermal progesterone cream saw a seven to eight percent increase in their bone density within the first year.

Not For Women Only

Over the last few years, Dr. Lee had also begun compiling information on estrogen’s role in prostate cancer. From a large number of anecdotal stories of men, Dr. Lee found many who experienced the complete reverse of prostate cancer after being treated with natural progesterone.

It seems that when men go through andropause they, like menopausal women, are also subject to estrogen dominance. As progesterone levels decrease with age, estrogen levels increase and can kick-start the cancer gene bc12 (the same gene that triggers breast cancer).

But progesterone turns on p53, the gene that causes cancer cells to commit suicide. Hence, Dr. Lee speculated that supplemental progesterone, in a transdermal form, might help prevent and treat all reproductive cancers – breast, ovary, uterine, endometrial and prostate.

Conventional medicine, on the other hand, believes that blocking the androgen testosterone is the best treatment for advanced prostate cancer. But a total of 27 trials involving 8,000 prostate cancer patients showed that a total androgen blockade improved the five-year survival rate by only 2 percent and the 10-year survival rate by only 0.7 percent. In addition, a total androgen blockade increases the number and severity of side effects such as depression, dementia and diarrhea which further affect the quality of life of a cancer patient.

New research by Brent Formby, Ph.D. at the Sansum Medical Research Institute in Santa Barbara, CA backs up Dr. Lee’s theory. His results showed that progesterone inhibits the growth of prostate cancer cells and that estradiol (estrogen) and dihydrotestosterone (bad testosterone) accelerate prostate cancer cell growth.

All of this, of course, is preliminary and much more research needs to be done. But the theory makes sense and the early studies are promising. Since each year over 400,000 men in the United States alone undergo prostate surgery, I’ll keep my ear to the ground so I can bring you the latest news on this potentially effective (and much safer) therapy for prostate cancer.

Meanwhile, we mourn the passing of the man who brought hope to millions of women searching for natural alternatives to HRT. He will surely be missed.

One Last Thing ...

Two new studies have recently been published that support Dr. Lee’s belief that menopause is a natural part of aging – and should be treated naturally. In the first, Australian researchers found that menopausal women who adopt a Japanese diet – centered around soy foods, fruits and vegetables – experience relief in as little as 12 weeks.

The study of 120 women aged between 50 and 65 also found adopting this kind of diet resulted in weight loss and lower blood pressure. And the women in the trial reported a reduction in hot flashes and palpitations as well as in feelings of depression, fatigue and lack of motivation. What’s more, the researchers noted that the subjects experienced improved bladder tone and reduced symptoms of incontinence.

The second study, which involved 203 postmenopausal women, also supported the use of soy for menopausal symptoms. In the double-blind, placebo-controlled trial, the women were randomly assigned to one of three treatment groups - a daily dose of either a placebo, a medium dose of supplemental isoflavones (0.5g soy extracts and 40 mg. isoflavones) or a high isoflavone dose (1,000 mg. soy extracts and 80 mg. isoflavones). All of the women were also given 500 mg. of calcium and 125 IU of vitamin D3 in addition to their daily treatments.

The researchers measured bone mineral density (BMD) and bone mineral content (BMC) at baseline and one year after treatment. By the end of the study, they found that the women in the high dose group had a mild, but significantly higher improvement in BMC compared to those in the placebo and mid-dose groups, proving that soy does indeed improve bone health.

For natural menopausal relief that also protects your heart and bones, try shifting your diet so that it contains plentiful amounts of soy in the form of tofu, edamame, soy milk and cheese, soy-based prepared foods and lots of fruits and veggies. For even more protection, follow Dr. Lee’s prescription: apply ¼ to ½ teaspoon of a transdermal progesterone cream (3 percent) twice a day for three weeks out of the month, with a week off each month to maintain the sensitivity of the progesterone receptors.

This Just In ...

Conventional wisdom has always maintained that getting enough sleep is key to staying healthy, and now there's new scientific evidence to back it up.

In the new study, German researchers repeatedly measured the levels of immune system antibodies in the blood of 19 men and women for 28 days after they had been vaccinated for hepatitis A. Half of the group got a full night's sleep after being immunized, while the rest were kept awake that night and the following day. Four weeks later, the well-rested group had nearly twice the antibody level of the sleep-deprived group.

According to the study’s lead author, sleep boosts the release of prolactin and growth hormone, two hormones that lab experiments suggest enhance the immune response. And even a single night of sleep deprivation can lower your antibody levels.

So if you’re shortchanging yourself in the sleep department, you may want to rethink your sleep habits before cold and flu season arrives. Getting your full eight hours just might help keep that nasty winter bug at bay!

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References:

Bonkhoff H, et al. “Progesterone receptor expression in human prostate cancer: correlation with tumor progression.” Prostate. 2001;48:285-291.

Chen YM, et al. “Soy isoflavones have a favorable effect on bone loss in Chinese postmenopausal women with lower bone mass: a double-blind, randomized, controlled trial.” Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism. 2003;88:4740-4747.

Lange T, et al. “Sleep Enhances the Human Antibody Response to Hepatitis A Vaccination.” Psychosomatic Medicine. 2003; 65:831-835.

Leonetti HB, et al. “Transdermal progesterone cream for vasomotor symptoms and postmenopausal bone loss.” Obstetrics and Gynocology. 1999; 94:225-228.

Miles J. “Japanese diet fights menopause.” AAP. 14 October 2003.

“Prostate Cancer Trialists’ Collaborative Group. Maximum androgen blockade in advanced prostate cancer: an overview of the randomized trials.” Lancet. 2000; 355: 1491-1498.