Help for hot flashes

Hot flashes affect many women who are entering menopause. Sometimes they affect women for the rest of their life but usually last until the end of the transition which is usually during the mid-50s. It is important to remember that menopause isn’t an illness and can be made better through lifestyle changes.

Companies may suggest that to treat hormonal imbalance drugs and even surgery are the best solution but generally speaking this isn’t true and is very dangerous. Because of this it is better to take less risky approaches such as treating menopause and hot flashes with alternative medicine or lifestyle changes. Read on to find three ways of helping hot flashes.

Three approaches to help hot flashes

There are three main approaches to help hot flashes and these can be placed into three levels which are catergorzied as: lifestyle changes, alternative medicine and drugs and surgery.

1: Lifestyle changes

This is the first level that you should consider and is the least risky. For this you need a strong mind and positive thinking to follow suggestions, which are three-fold:

Healthy eating – Following a diet that is rich in estrogenic foods such as soy, apples, alfalfa, cherries, potatoes, rice, wheat and yams can help in your battle against hot flashes. It is important to remember that in countries with high soy intake in their diet there is no word for hot flashes as less than 10% of women suffer from the menopausal problem.

Exercise – Muscle work and around 30 minutes of exercise a day decreases the tension in your body and helps you to relax, keeping the body functioning properly and helping against hot flashes.

Stress reduction – Techniques such as yoga and meditation help to release all negative energy and this takes you away from the usual problems. It is important to consider this as a prevention technique as well as a cure for hot flashes.

2: Alternative medicine

These alternative medicines involve little to no risk and are often suggested by the professionals as the best way to treat menopausal symptoms and hot flashes when taken together with lifestyle changes. Herbal remedies and acupuncture have long established themselves as the best treatment for many problems associated with menopause.

There are two types of herbs used for treating hot flashes and these are:

• Phytoestrogenic herbs – These are herbs that although being good at treating low hormonal levels aren’t on the same level as the non-estrogenic herbs for helping hot flashes because they add hormones to your body instead of making your body create them and this makes the body less responsive to producing its own estrogen. Examples of these herbs are Black Cohosh and Dong Quai.

• Non-estrogenic herbs – Unlike phytoestrogen herbs these don’t contain any estrogen and instead the herbs help to nourish your hormonal glands to produce your own natural hormones and this helps to rebalance the levels.

Professionals would agree that the best route to take, in terms of helping hot flashes, is combining an alternative non-estrogenic medicine lwith lifestyle changes.

3: Drugs and surgery

Coming as option three is drugs and surgery – which is both the highest risk and cost. Hormone replacement therapy (HRT) is usually the option but is used as a last resort, particularly since the 2007 American Academy of Neurology meeting where findings about the risks put a huge doubt over the use of HRT. It is something that should be given considerable thought alongside discussions with your doctor.

Sometimes it is a trial and error scenario when trying to figure out what works best for you and different things can help at different times but generally speaking a healthy lifestyle alongside an alternative, herbal medicine is considered the best way to both prevent and help hot flashes.

To learn more about Hot Flashes