Throughout a woman's lifetime, hormones mark known changes, both physiologic and observable. Although puberty is the most evident change, many hormonal changes are manifested with aging. Peri-menopause, Menopause and Post-menopause are periods in a woman’s lifetime that may produce symptoms from declining or changing hormone levels.

Common symptoms include hot flashes, night sweats, loss of concentration, insomnia, irritability, weight gain etc. When symptoms are hard to deal with and quality of life is important, women are left with having to make difficult decisions about taking hormones. Your doctor is a good person to ask about the choices you have in taking hormones or other alternatives.

Hormone therapy is often a medicinal approach for the improvement of symptoms. In functional medicine it is one component of understanding the physiological processes that influence health and therefore act as an intervention for prevention of diseases, especially in the cardiovascular areas.