Menopause During The Aging Process

There are many milestones that occur during the aging process, one of those processes for women is menopause. The medicalization of menopause has created a market for treatment and prevention of the symptoms related to menopause (Burrell, 2009). Menopause is defined as the “occurring 12 months after a woman’s final menstrual period” (Bjorklund, 2015, p. 54). Women usually go through menopause between 47 and 55 years old and experience a drop in estrogen and progesterone during perimenopause for 3-5 years before menopause occurs (Bjorklund, 2015). The decline in hormones causes primary aging for men and women (Bjorklund, 2015). The current popular treatments for menopause are using exogenous hormones (usually estrogen and progesterone) …show more content…
However, in the process of preventing these symptoms of menopause there are side effects of HRT that need to be considered. Harmful side effects of HRT can include increased risk of stroke, heart attack, and possibly cancer risk. HRT is not as common for men as they age; only 20% of men experiences lower levels of testosterone after the age of 60 (Bjorklund, 2015). In addition to sex hormones, there are other hormones that are associated with aging. Dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) and growth hormone (GH) are two hormones that make a decline with age and contribute to primary aging. There have been some animal studies that show a protective effect by replacing these hormones and even reverse some aging. However, these results have not been proven in human models (Bjorklund, 2015). Exogenous estrogen therapy is very beneficial to assuage the symptoms of menopause for women. There is some support that replacing estrogen helps protect women from decreasing bone density and heart functioning (Morse & Rice, 2005). Five to seven year after menopause women can lose up to 20% of their bone density, therefore it is important to have a treatment to prevent future bone fractures (Short,