Tramadol

If you are a woman, your doctor is likely to recommend estrogen supplements after menopause as a way to slow osteoporosis, although the effect is not much over the long run and is rarely able to stop or reverse it.

Many women find these hormones distasteful because the most commonly prescribed brand, Premarin, is actually made from pregnant mares’ urine, from whence comes its name. The well - publicized pictures of tens of thousands of horses chained by the neck on urine production farms are disquieting to say the least. (Other brands are synthetic or plant - derived, but have not been marketed as aggressively as Premarin.)

What has many physicians worried is that estrogens increase the risk of breast cancer. The Harvard Nurses’ Health Study found that women taking estrogens have 30 to 80 percent more breast cancer, compared to other women.32 Adding progesterone derivatives, such as Provera, does not offset this increased risk. Given that the lifetime risk of breast cancer in North American women is already one in eight, anything that increases that risk even further is of obvious concern.

Controlling calcium losses is a much safer strategy. If you already have osteoporosis, there is an additional step that you might consider to reverse it.

One of the most exciting breakthroughs in recent research is the discov - ery that a natural, nonprescription preparation, called natural proges - terone, actually helps build healthy new bone where it has been lost.

By a fluke of nature, an exact copy of human progesterone exists in wild yams, soybeans, and certain other plants. The amount in cooked foods is not enough to help, but it is easy for manufacturers to isolate the progesterone and put it into a transdermal skin cream. The progesterone passes through the skin into the bloodstream. It reaches the bone, where it stimulates bone - building cells, called osteoblasts, to build healthy new bone. In one three - year study of postmenopausal women treated with natural progesterone, bone density increased by about 15 percent, which is more than enough to have a major effect on fracture risk.33

Many products with “wild yam extract” on their labels do not contain enough progesterone to be of any benefit. However, the most popular brand, called Pro - Gest, does have adequate and effective natural progesterone. It is available from Transitions for Health.