Herbal remedies for menopause?

I’ve been looking for some good information on using herbal supplements to treat the symptoms of menopause. I finally found two real, honest-to-goodness clinical studies that yielded some pretty good results. Not the “miracle” I was looking for, but definitely good to know.

The two studies were conducted by the University of Illinois  and Northwestern University, both in Chicago. The first study included 89 women who were experiencing moderate to severe hot flashes, at least 35 per week. The women were divided into random groups, and they kept diaries for 12 months detailing the number and severity of the hot flashes and night sweats.

One group of women was given a black cohosh botanical supplements, a second received  red clover, a third group was given hormone therapy, and the final group received a placebo. What was really interesting is that the number of hot flashes per week decreased over time across all groups- black cohosh 34%, red clover 57%, placebo 63% and hormone therapy 94%. What this showed is that the only real results come from hormone therapy, and just thinking you're getting treatment will bring you some relief.

The second study focused on verbal memory and cognitive skills along with the hot flashes. (Now here's where I'm hoping for a miracle--can anyone relate to my fuzzy mind?) A sub-group of 66 women in the four sectors from the first study agreed to participate in an extension of the investigation while their hot flashes were being studied.  During that time, they had periodic evaluations to measure recollection of words and short stories. They also wore monitors that measured skin temperature during hot flashes. Again, there was no difference between those who took the herbal supplements and those who didn't when it came to improving cognitive functions. Those who took the hormone therapy actually had a slight decrease in memory during the trial.

So what does all this tell us? Those herbal supplements that claim to be the miraculous answer to our symptoms of menopause don't work any better than a baby aspirin. Hormone replacement therapy works, but can decrease memory, and also increases the risks of breast cancer, strokes and heart attacks.

Bottom line, imagine yourself feeling cooler--it's now a proven remedy, and has no side effects!

Read the entire study from Medical News Today.