Episode Link: Menopause Research Update

SUMMARY: Colleen and Bridgett discuss a summer roundup of the most recent menopause research on the topics of meno belly and the Musculoskeletal Syndrome of Menopause

The Musculoskeletal Syndrome of Menopause: Dr. Vonda Wright

Meno Belly: What It Is & How To Get Rid of It: Midi Health

EXCLUSIVE TO HFCT LISTENERS: UP TO 40% OFF AND A FREE GIFT FROM COZY EARTH

TRANSCRIPT:

COLLEEN: Welcome to How Flashes and Cool Topics Podcasts, The Voice for Women in Midlife and Beyond. My name is Colleen.

BRIDGETT:My name is Bridgett.

COLLEEN: And on today’s episode, Bridgett and I spent the summer enjoying our summer,but we also spent doing a lot of research on some of the newest information coming out on menopause because literally on a weekly basis there is research popping up on menopause the conditions surrounding menopause the symptoms the treatment and we just felt like an episode kind of updating what we have discovered for our own personal experiences and what we’ve read through would be really helpful for it was helpful for us so I’m pretty sure it’s going to be helpful for you guys as well. So, Bridget, are you ready to talk menop? Oh, my goodness. Yes, and there were so much research done this summer,
just like Helene just said, so much new information, valuable information, helpful information. So we’re going to get into it.

BRIDGETT: Absolutely. It’s time,
COLLEEN: Let’s start talking about. So there are a lot of doctors that we follow on the topic of menopause. And we recommend a lot of them. We’ve had a lot of them on this podcast. Doctors like Dr. Mary Claire Haver, Dr. Heather Hirsch, Dr. Rachel Rubin, Dr. Somi Javid, the list could go on and on. And one of the doctors we had on last season was Dr. Vonda Wright, who is an orthopedic surgeon. And Dr. Wright recently wrote an article called the Musculoskeletal Syndrome of Menopause. And it’s basically research on exactly what it sounds like, your skeletal health. And she has termed that phrase, musculoskeletal syndrome of menopause. I’m going to call it MSM because that’s just a mouthful to call.
She has kind of coined that phrase to address symptoms related to loss of muscle mass, loss of bone density, osteoporosis, osteoarthritis, and why it is so important for primary care physicians and orthopedic surgeons to be aware of the relationship between menopause and our bone health. This is a personal topic for me, since I do have osteoporosis and I also have been diagnosed with osteoarthritis. So all of this, I was like, yes, that’s me. Yes, that’s me. Yes, that’s me. And because this is such a new area that they’ve started researching, yes, menopause hormone therapy is beneficial, but not in all instances. And so there is some question on some of it. And Bridget and I always want to give you the positive and the negatives, the full picture, because as we have mentioned before on this podcast, Bridget is on menopause hormone therapy. I am not. Now, neither of us have an issue with it. If I needed it, I would definitely take it. And I have been doing a lot of research this summer because of the proactive benefits of menopause hormone therapy. So we’ll talk about that a little later. But just to get started, so MSM affects more than 70 % of all midlife women. And when I say that, I mean your bone issues, bone health affects more than 70 % of all life women, especially in menopause and postmenopause, because women can lose up to 10 % of their bone density during perimenopause and up to 0 .6 % per year postmenopause.
Peaking joint pain and frozen soldiers and all those fun things people talk about can peak within first two years of postmenopause. And I am in the first two years of postmenopause, and I’ve noticed that my joint pain has definitely increased.
So this was an article that I was like, hmm, I need to take notes and highlight this, Bridget.

BRIDGETT: Right. You know, it’s, it’s so interesting after reading this article. I think about, well, now it’s become different pain issues have become kind of like, well, that’s just normal. And then I’m thinking, wait a minute, this wasn’t normal 15 years ago. And it shouldn’t be acceptable. It shouldn’t be acceptable. It can creep up on you. And it is something that we’re going to talk about in here, like Colleen said, about the use of hormones can be something that maybe can help relieve it. It’s an option that can be a relief, but not everybody wants to do that. Not everybody can do that. And we’re going to talk about that as well.

COLLEEN: so estrogen the fall of estrogen the decrease in estrogen affects every aspect of your body so it’s no surprise that it’s also going to affect your bone health. It can increase inflammation. It can decrease bone density, bone mineral density. And it can also lead to osteoporosis, arthritis, sarcopenia. Sarcopenia just means loss of bone muscle mass. So that’s a decrease in bone muscle mass. And I’m going to start to arthrologia, and I hope I’m saying that right, that is the experience of joint pain, which a lot of us will experience. And many women have been complaining of your frozen shoulder. So what’s happening? As the estrogen starts to decrease in our body, it is affecting our lean muscle mass. Your age is also affecting your lean muscle mass. And that’s where I’m going to start with sarcopenia. You’re going to notice it because you may not have the strength you had before or you feel like your muscle tone is decreasing. And that can really affect your quality of life. So Dr. Wright talks about menopause hormone therapy as an option, but she also gives us some other suggestions and suggestions like vitamin D. Now, you should be getting that through nutrition, but you can supplement vitamin D and she also talks about a combination of vitamin D and magnesium as helping kind of the vitamin D be more effective in your body.  Resistance training. She talks about the fact that perhaps our idea of less weight more reps isn’t really accurate for women in our demographic. We should be doing heavier weights, less reps. So you’re getting to that muscle fatigue point, which is actually helping strengthen the muscles around your bones to protect your bones. So that’s important. We also have that they need for protein. 25 grams of protein per meal is ideal, but everybody’s different. Everybody is different. And, you know, check, you know, you can do your own research about nutrition. But if you could increase your protein intake, that will definitely help with the low muscle tone and decrease in muscle mass. And she also talks about vitamin K2 as being something that might help as well. So these are more conservative options. Aging is also a factor. So we have to take care of ourselves. Exercise. You know, it’s great if you take supplements, but if you’re not exercising and you’re not eating right, it’s only going to take you so far. So menopause hormone therapy can also help improve. That is an option to talk to your doctors about. Osteoporosis. You know, I’ve already mentioned. I have osteoporosis and it’s a problem that affects more than 200 million postmenopausal women worldwide.
And that can lead to fractures. And fractures can lead to something as simple, and I don’t want to say it’s simple, but something as low as chronic pain or it can cause death. It is serious. The older we get, fractures can cause death. So it is something to – Breaking your hip. Breaking your hip. What was it, 25 % of people survive the next five years if they break their hip?
BRIDGETT: It’s terrifying. There’s a lot of research out there that shows that a fractured hip can lead to death.

COLLEEN: I mean, it really is a scary statistic that you want check out we right now i believe that insurance covers uh dexas scans for women 65 and up but if you do have a family history and you can get your doctor to write down the right codes 50 and up i got a dexas scan that was covered by insurance 50 and up because my mom and my siblings all have um Osteoporosis so i have a strong strong family history of it.

BRIDGETT: I got a DEXA scan when I was 40, and I think I’ve said this before on the podcast. I went to some women’s health fair, and they had a little thing that you put your foot in, and I put my right foot in there, and my score was terrible.
And I went, they paid for it because they said my score was so bad. I called, and they paid for the DEXA scan, And the rest of me was fine. I had injured that foot in a car wreck, though. So that could have been why that showed up. But Dr. Wright did talk about the fact that it’s going to vary wherever you live. But typically it’s $200 to $250 out of pocket to get. If it’s not covered, right? If it’s not covered to get a Dexas scan. So if you can do that, if that is something you could do just to get that baseline down. And then you could tell, you could go back and compare later. Is my bone density worse? Is it staying the same? And Colleen, that you were able to compare.

COLLEEN: Right. I actually had one done pre -menopausal. I actually had one perimenopausal. And then I had one a couple months ago. And even though I haven’t had a large decline, thank goodness, I’m pretty stable. My fracture risk has gone up. So I’m actually going to the doctor in October, and of course I will take you guys with me, you know, to keep you informed. And look into, I’m going to see an endocrinologist to look into a new medication called EVENITY.
And all of this will be in our show notes. We also have links. A lot of the brands we love about this stuff is on our website as well, hotflashescooltopics.com.but I’m going to an endocrinologist to talk about Evenity, which is a new medication that is supposed to slow or help slow bone loss plus actually regenerate bone. And if that is an option for me, I will try it and keep you guys posted. Hopefully it will be. I don’t know. But there’s so much information and so many options coming out on literally, it seems like a daily basis. It’s not, but it just seems like every day there is something new to talk about. And the last thing we wanted to talk about as far as the musculoskeletal syndrome of menopause is osteoarthritis. And one of the things, again, something I have, lucky me. One of the things that I was surprised to learn is that women experience more debilitating arthritic pain than men. I’m not surprised. I shouldn’t be surprised. I know. I know. It’s just, you know, lucky Yes. But what I was more surprised about is there’s recent meta -analysis, and to be honest, I don’t know what meta -analysis means, but it’s written in the report, that there is a positive, and that does not mean a good. That means a positive association between menopause hormone therapy and joint replacement. So what does that mean? That means that they are seeing a link between women who are on menopause hormone therapy and the need for bone replacement hips, knees, different joints. Now, that’s early research and further research is necessary. But it’s an interesting. I had not heard that before. You know, and I mean, that, you know, that is something that can be helpful.
BRIDGETT: But boy, going through that, I have not been through it personally, but I know I have a sister that just had her hip replaced. And then she’s had one knee and is waiting to get the other knee. My mother -in -law had both knees replay joint. link in the research, but that doesn’t mean you have to be on MHT.

COLLEEN: And when we say menopause hormone therapy, a lot of people will know it as hormone replacement therapy, but doctors are just trying to say MHT, menopause hormone therapy, just kind of the umbrella. Right. HRT is typically for someone that had early menopause or surgical menopause, and they have to have their hormones replaced it. Another thing that was mentioned in the article is creatine. It’s created naturally in your body from your kidneys, your liver, and your pancreas. But if there’s a decrease in creatine, that can affect your bone health as well. So there are supplements out there that you can take. We have one listed on our Brands We Love page, if you want to check that out. Including creatine has shown a positive bone mineral density for women. So it’s another option. It’s a conservative option that you can try. It’s also been linked to some health with cognitive health as well. So there are so many things that we can be doing that are on a, you know, we consider it like a spectrum. Your symptoms will dictate. Your family history will dictate your body, your side effects, all that. But it’s a spectrum from very conservative conservative, very aggressive, and everyone lies on a different part of that spectrum. But we want to make sure you have the information to answer your personal journey. So, you know, take the pieces that work for you, go to the doctor, ask them about these. And again, if the doctor doesn’t know, find another doctor. We talk about that all the time. Right. Use the link. Go to our website. Click on that link. Print the article out or just have it on your phone, show your doctor, the article. And follow the doctors that we recommend on Instagram.
We recently did a seminar on the Modern Prairie app talking about these exact issues. And one of the things that Bridgett and I recommended there, and I’d like to reiterate it here, is that you can go on some of these platforms,
telehealth platforms, and not only seek treatment through them if you don’t have a menopause specialist in your area, but also get free information on what’s happening. They have blogs. They have research articles. We have them. There’s so much information out there. You can follow the doctors on Instagram. We follow a lot of them. We recommend a lot of them. You’ll see it on our social media platform and you can go on all of them and follow it. We have a great newsletter that’s starting to come out this and that’s going to have a lot more information on this research. And menopause, midlife, what you should do to enjoy your life, what you shouldn’t do. We’re giving you options. You can choose. It’s like a Chinese menu. You can take a little bit from A, a little B. But we want to give you those options. So make sure you are subscribed to our newsletter. The link can be found on our website, haflashes cool topics .com. And there will be a lot more information on there as well. Now, a second topic that we talked about was the meno belly and how it is not all in your head. It actually is all in your belly. And Bridget’s going to talk about that research.

BRIDGETT: Yes. There was an article that came out on August 5th of this year titled Meno Belly, What Is It and How to Get Rid of It by Liz Krieger. I hope I’m saying her last name correctly, K -R -I -E -G -E -R, and it was medically reviewed, so that is always important when you’re reading articles to have it medically reviewed. It talks about menO belly. It is the result of an increase in abdominal fat, often associated with perimenopause and menopause. Female bodies are typically,
they typically have their fat around their hips and their thighs, but when you start to go through menopause and menopause, your estrogen is decreasing, testosterone is decreasing, and yes, females do produce testosterone. Premenopausal females produce testosterone. We have learned this from many doctors that have been on our podcast, and it decreases as you’re going through perimenopause and menopause to almost nothing. And when that happens, the fat in your body is distributed your body will change and it goes around your abdomen and that is visceral fat around your abdomen which can cause a whole host of problems it can it goes around your organs your vital organs it can increase inflammation that can lead to disease so it is really important that we talk about this and what can we do about it because what you have been doing in the past may not be working anymore I mean, it just like came on. I was, I always talk about I was a pair.
I’ve been a pear shape my whole life. Then all of a sudden it’s like, what’s going on? Why is this going to my stomach? I never had a big stomach. And all the way all of a sudden I

COLLEEN: ‘ve always had a big stomach, Bridget. So it was not a shock. I’m saying everybody has their place and my place is my belly. And I think one of the interesting things I noted in that article was from Dr. Mindy Goldman,
who’s the chief medical officer for Midi Health. And she actually said, they quoted her saying many clinical trials and animal studies have revealed that the decrease in estrogen seen in menopause triggers worsening insulin sensitivity.
This drives up your floating blood sugar while starving your cells and results in weight gain as your body is triggered to store fat. And I was like, oh, that’s an aha moment.
BRIDGETT: Isn’t that something that is happening? And so, you know, you’ve got this around your middle. It’s increasing insulin resistance. Your metabolism slowing down. 87 % of women, especially the midi patients that they talked about in the article, complain of weight gain, really just about everybody I’ve ever met.

COLLEEN: I was going to say, who’s the 13 %? I want to know. I’m like, who are you?

BRIDGETT: I know every woman that I know that is my age, and even women that are, I would consider small women, they still have complained of weight gain in midlife. So this decrease in estrogen. What was it that they can increase per year in midlife?

COLLEEN: I know you had a statistic about weight gain.

BRIDGETT: Weight gain. Let’s see. One point five pounds per year postmenopausal is that yeah 1 .5 pounds per year um that also we’re burning 250 to 300 calories less per day during course we are like oh really come on so it but that’s what’s happening okay also during this time of life you have hunger hormones you have leptin that usually suppresses your appetite well guess what that decreases during this time of life. But Grellin, that makes you hungry, increases during this time of life. So there’s just all kinds of different good news there. Also, you have sleep disturbances during this time of life. You could be having night sweats. You could just be waking up for no reason, which I hear, we hear a lot. 3 a .m., yes. That’s going to mess up your weight control during this time of life because if you’re not sleeping well and you’re just trying to do anything to stay awake, sometimes you tend to eat to help you stay awake. So that’s another thing. So what can we do about it? Well, just like Colleen was talking about in the last part of this episode that she was talking about increasing muscle mass. That is so important. All of these things play a role. Increasing your muscle mass, physical activity, things that will help reduce cortisol in your body, having enough protein, just like she was talking about earlier, having one to two grams of protein per kilogram. Okay, now we’re pounds here in the U .S. We talk about pounds. So let’s say you are 150 pounds. You want to have 70 to 140 grams of protein, or like Colleen was talking about earlier, 25 grams. Go for 25 grams of protein per meal. Now, One of the things I like to do Greek yogurt, if you can eat yogurt, Greek yogurt. I always do non -fat. Greek yogurt has. Some of them have 18 to 20 grams of protein per serving. I add a few little pumpkin seeds on there, a few little, a bit of nuts to get it up to that 25 grams. Things like that are great.

COLLEEN: I do like Ensure shakes, which have protein in them. I’ll do overnight oats with fruit and it, which have, we’re just giving you options, people.

BRIDGETT: Things that have chicken, huge protein, meat, fish, vegetables, beans, but do it when you’re not going to be going out to dinner or Or you can build up a tolerance. They do say, you know, I know red meat in moderation or reallylow, like really, if you can try, I love red meat. I mean, I do. I love it. But I do try to limit it to once or twice a week just because I know I don’t need all the other stuff in there. I don’t need the cholesterol that comes along with that. I don’t need that.
But edamame is a great one.

COLLEEN: I love edamome. Oh my goodness. Don’t love the salt that I put on them.

BRIDGETT: Oh, I know. You got to kind of, kind of take that down a little bit. But adding protein powder is a great way too. If you’re doing something, just sprinkling some protein powder. It’s great to try to get it, you know, without supplements. But if you have to supplement, that’s something that you can do as well. But building your physical activity is really important too. There has been some research that was in this article as well that was surprising to me, but I understand that sometimes if you, some research indicated that more than 40 minutes of your physical activity could increase your cortisol hormone in your body, which is something you don’t want. Stress hormone goes right. Yes. Yes. However, they did say that if you are doing things that you’re doing them more than 40 minutes, you don’t need to. We talk about that that could help a whole host of issues during this time of life.

COLLEEN: And we’ve had a few experts on to talk about sleep hygiene and how to improve it. And they, you know, they really recommend, I know it’s hard to get rid of the phone for like an hour before bed. But if you can, limit your screen time. Don’t eat spicy foods before you go to bed. Don’t exercise before you go to bed. Try to like, you know, relax. Maybe trying to have a routine.
BRIDGETT: It said, you know, so many say, save the bedroom for sex and sleep. Like, you know, I have a television, but I don’t watch it. I rarely watch the television in my bedroom. Now, my old house, I did. This house, I don’t. Only if I’m sick. The only time I ever have that TV on is if I’ve just gotten my COVID or my, oh, my goodness, your husband had it, the thing like Shingles. Shingles. When I had my shingles and my COVID vaccine on the same day, I had to spend the day in bed. That’s the only time I really turn on that television.
COLLEEN: And what about hormone replacement therapy, menopause hormone therapy?

BRIDGETT: Well, yes. I mean, that was another thing. Now, I’m just telling you my personal experience and I love my. We are not doctors. We are not doctors. This is my personal experience with that. I am on menopause hormone replacement. I’ve been on it probably, I don’t know, five or six years now. You will pull that. I will be buried with this patch on. I will be buried with this patch on. So I am not giving this up. I did not find that it helped me in the area of weight loss.
I didn’t. That is me personally. It may affect other people differently. It did help my mood a lot. It did help me stop the hot sweats, hot sweats, hot sweats, hot flashes. But, and then it did help me want to exercise more because I wasn’t drenched just turning around. And I literally would be drenched sweeping my floor before I was on menopause hormone replacement. However, I personally didn’t find it helped, but it has been different people. It has helped. So according to that study, it has helped.

COLLEEN: And there’s also obviously the introduction of all the semiglutides. You got Ozemphic. You’ve got Wagovi, Monjaro. And that is an individual choice. A lot have comorbidities that the semiglutides can’t be combined with but they can help diabetes. You can’t do a shot and expect everything to, you know, lose weight and be healthy. You still have to keep your body strong and healthy. So you still have to be exercising and eating well. But it is another option that has been introduced. And some of our doctors highly recommend it.They say it’s great.

BRIDGETT: Right. Right. I mean, they say obesity is, is an epidemic. And if it can help curb that and lead to a healthier, longer life, then that is really important. But But also just in the whole scheme of things with this menobilly, the issue is to be healthy. It’s not to be thin or skinny. You want to be healthy. And if you can get rid of that visceral fat that is causing the inflammation that is causing damage to your internal organs, that’s the most important thing. It’s not this number on a scale. It is not fitting into whatever dress size. It’s to feel good about yourself to have a healthy, longer life. And healthy longer life. So remember that part. It, you know, even though I lost weight and I talk about this, I did lose weight, 30 pounds over the past year. I’ve kept it off. I’m not starving myself. I am not the weight that I was when I was younger. I’m still heavier than I was, but I feel really good about good about myself. And they talk about in the article,
your happy weight. I feel like I’m at my happy weight right now. And that’s very important to me. Again, it’s so much more than a number on a scale.

COLLEEN: It’s how you feel. And are you eating healthy? And are you taking care of yourself? Are you giving yourself mental breaks? It’s emotional. It’s physical. It’s psychological. It’s so many factors. There’s research out there now that’s saying sometimes women, when they’re going through menopause, will actually lose their healthy fat and have an increase in unhealthy white fat in which extra calories are stored. So you’re going to learn more. We’ll keep your post on what we learn, but it’s not in your head. It actually is happening. And there are options that you can address and explore. And we’ll have more experts on for the podcast to talk about that. You know, there’s so many articles and so much research this coming out and we really want you guys to be educated when you go to the doctors for your own personal health because it’s your health. It’s your journey. And we can throw all this information at you but see, pick what works for you, pick and shoes. What we will do is have all this information in our show notes.
Also, again, check out the brands we love that we have we’ll have different brands that we use and different products that we use that really have helped in our personal menopause journeys as well as a lot of the people that are guests that we speak with and we have some amazing guests coming up this season so make sure you’re following us on all forms of social media and you are subscribed to our newsletter which
you can do very easily at howflashescooltopics.com We are going to have a lot of information on that. We are also going to be doing some lives on YouTube addressing question and answers because we get so many of them.
We just simply can’t answer them all in one episode or reply as quickly as we would like. So we’re going to start doing some Instagram and, well, maybe some YouTube lives. So make sure you’re following us on YouTube, Hot Flashes Cool Topics. We have so many episodes over there. And we also have a lot of questions and answers. We kind of give more of a brief synopsis if you have a question about something and we’ll do an answer from one of our experts.
Thank you so much for listening. Bridget, did I forget anything? I

BRIDGETT: don’t think so. Just, you know, make sure you listen, rate review, follow us on all forms of social media. And there have been some incredible articles and research done this summer.
And we’ll have those in the links. But can you also talk about that little download button on Apple Podcasts because oh yes yes so on Apple podcast things have changed a little bit so if you go to our podcast make sure you follow our show and hit the download button there’s like the three little dots hit that hit download that way you will be sure that you won’t miss a single one of our episodes because sometimes you might be busy the day that they come out so just hit that and then you can listen to it whenever you want, it’ll be saved there. So they did change that. So make sure you’re following us on that podcast. And we really, it makes all the algorithms happy if you rate and review and, you know, just follow our stories. Just like Colleen said, we’re going to add little questions. We’d love to hear from you with questions too. So make sure you’re sending us an email at hot flashescooltopics@gmail .com. If there’s anything that you would like answered, we will do the research, we will find the expert, and we will find an answer for you.
COLLEEN: Thank you for listening. We hope this updated you on some of the menopause research for this summer. We’ll have more experts on this coming season to talk about more specific information. Until then,
have a great week, guys. We’ll talk to you next Wednesday.

BRIDGETT: Thanks for listening. Bye.