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Hormone Replacement Therapy Still Good For Menopause?
Posted on March 5th, 2010 No commentsHormone replacement therapy, now more commonly known as hormone therapy, use to be medical worlds standard treatment for those women suffering from hot flashes and other side effects of going through menopause. They also thought that it could help prevent osteoporosis and even heart disease.
In 2002 however; the minds of many in the medical field changed when they saw the results of a clinical test. What the test uncovered is that the hormone replacement therapy could actually be causing a lot more health hazards than benefits. As the doctors saw the increase of health hazards with women on this therapy they began to prescribe it less and less and a lot of women completely stopped it on their own when they heard the news about it may being dangerous.
Those who took the hormone replacement therapy were given estrogen and progestin. This therapy would ease some of the symptoms of menopause making life easier for the women going through a difficult menopause. The long term prescriptions for this are rarely given now, on occasion though, women are given the treatment for short term.
If the bioidentical hormone replacement is given short term, there still might be some health benefits. Over short periods of time, doctors have discovered that it can help lessen the chances of getting osteoporosis. If used moderately, the hormone therapy may still be able to lower the risk of developing colorectal cancer. Heart disease risk can be lowered if estrogen is given in the early stage of postmenopausal years but not throughout the entire cycle of menopause.
There are risks for taking hormone replacement therapy and women who are experiencing menopause should weigh the facts and figure out if menopause is causing that much disruption in their lives that it would be worth chancing the hazards that come with the therapy.
Long term use of the therapy actually increased the threat of heart disease in women who took the real therapy. Breast cancer appeared to increase with long term use. Strokes increased in women that took the long term therapy. There were also an increase in false positive mammograms.
On the other hand, if women only took estrogen did not seem to have an increase in heart disease or breast cancer, but; they did have an increase in strokes, blood clots in their legs and an increase in abnormal mammograms.
If your menopausal symptoms are far greater than the risk, you should talk to your doctor if the following things are bothering you the most. If you have severe hot flashes and other menopausal symptoms that are interfering with daily life. It has been discovered that you have lost bone mass and you have stopped having your period before the age of forty.
If you experience any of the above mentioned situations, it might be wise for you to consider the treatment anyway. Your doctor will be able to identify whether or not what you are experiencing is extreme enough to begin you on the hormone therapy.
Compounding pharmacists are professionals with specialized and trustworthy expertise in the medical field. Among the best within their industry, they have knowledge of procedures like the Bioidentical Hormone Replacement, or better known as the BHRT.
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How Do You Find The Best All Natural Skin Care Products?
Posted on March 3rd, 2010 No commentsThere is a worldwide movement towards more natural skin care products. And there’s a good reason for this. There are now millions of women looking for natural skin care and trying to determine which are the best all natural skin care products.
Slowly consumers are recognizing that our cosmetics and personal and body care products as well as many skin care products can contain ingredients that can potentially be dangerous.
For example lead was found in over 50% of big brand lipsticks tested in a recent study.
And it’s fine to be wanting to look better or smell better, but doing that at the risk of our health isn’t smart. Who wants lead on their lips?
As this is becoming more well known skin care manufacturers are recognizing this trend towards natural skin care and anti aging products and natural cosmetics, soaps and much much more. The are recognizing it and looking to enter the market.
Its no coincidence that L’Oreal has recently bought The Body Shop, a huge seller of all natural personal products.
So back to skin care. Firstly lets ask ourselves what all natural means. First thing to note is that there is no formal definition of all natural when it comes to skin care products, or cosmetics or other products.
Natural means what you want it to mean, and so there are companies making products as “natural” that contain chemical ingredients that most would not consider to be natural at all.
So if there is no formal definition of all natural what do we do? Well lets consider why were looking for the best all natural skin care products in the first place.
Well remember, for most women the reason they are looking for natural skin care products is that they want products that are SAFE to use, as well as work well.
So we can, once we know this, use this information to our advantage.
So, how do we find these products? Lets look at how we determine if a product should be safe. There is a website called the cosmetic safety database. It considers the health risks inherent in a wide range of cosmetics and skin care products and more. It rates the potential health risks of various ingredients in these products.
So you can use this information to search the ingredients of personal products to see if it is considered that they pose any health risk. As an example you could search “parabens” (a popular and cheap preservative often used in personal products) and see what you get.
Then search out the website of the Campaign For Safe Cosmetics. There you can find a compact that any company can sign to pledge them to only producing safe products that don’t contain potentially dangerous ingredients. Get there and you can search this to see if the company that makes the products you use has signed.
And if the company that makes the products you use has signed you know they should make safe products.
So you’ve found a company that makes natural skin care products and has signed. So their products are safe. But how do you know they’re any good? Well to me any company that offers a money back guarantee on their products must have good products. But even amongst the natural skin care companies that have signed getting a guarantee is very rare.
Yes there is a company that has signed the compact and offers a full money back guarantee on their products, and they make the best all natural skin care products.
I’ll tell you which company does this on my website.
Want to find the company that makes the Best All Natural Skin Care Products? Visit Peter’s website that looks at all aspects of great Natural Skin Care
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Can You Reverse (And Prevent) Sun Damage To Your Skin Causing Premature Skin Ageing?
Posted on February 20th, 2010 No commentsThere’s nothing you can do about aging, and as you age your skin ages with you. One of the worst causes of skin ageing is excessive sun damage from overexposure to UV in the Sun’s rays. Can you help prevent and even reverse skin sun damage?
Too much time spent in the sun is terrible for your skin. Whether you get sunburned or even if you just spend a lot of time in the sun you can age your skin prematurely. Along with another factor, namely smoking, these are the 2 worst things you can do to ensure your skin will show your age earlier.
It is well known that UV rays in sun light can be very damaging to your skin. Of course excessive sun exposure can lead to skin cancer and this can in turn can lead to death, however not so many people are aware that excessive sun exposure also speeds up the effects of ageing on your skin. This is what is known as photo aging.
It can be a little difficult preventing skin sun damage if you go out in the sun regularly. Of course you can always wear a shirt and a hat however it is still possible to get your face burned under a hat, for example by reflection from water. And it will certainly help staying out of the sun in the middle of the day during summer.
Of course there’s always sunscreens however it is also not well known that many sunscreens do not offer complete protection from all the harmful rays of the sun, particularly from UVA, and that it’s still possible to get skin damage from the sun even when using sunscreens.
It is possible to get natural sunscreens. There are a number of components of plants, for example, that will act as a natural sunscreen and help protect you from burning. Not only that but several of these, according to some of the most recent science, can actually help reverse the effects of photo-aging.
Lycopene is one of these ingredients. If you read the health literature you may well know about lycopene. It’s an ingredient of tomatoes and the studies are showing that lycopene can have some beneficial effects on your health. For example there is growing evidence that increasing your intake of lycopene can help prevent breast cancer in women and prostate cancer in men. On top of this there is now evidence that more lycopene can help reverse the effects of photo-aging on your skin and therefore help reverse skin sun damage you may have suffered in earlier years.
Lycopene is not the only natural sunscreen offering benefits to your skin. There are other natural ingredients also offering similar benefits. Whilst you should not be relying on natural sunscreens alone to help protect your skin they are worthwhile to increase your UV resistance, and it does seem from the science that these ingredients can help reverse photo-aging.
Science is slowly understanding more and more about photo-aging and how it works, and also that one of the 2 most damaging things for your skin is the effects of photo-aging from excessive sun exposure. And science is able to produce new products that can capture the benefits of ingredients such as these.
An example is a new omega 3 supplement recently introduced to the market which includes lycopene as an active ingredient as well as other ingredients to increase your skin’s natural resistance to sunburn and to help reverse the effects of photo-aging. And of course omega 3 essential fatty acids are themselves known to be of a very similar chemical make up to the oil that is naturally produced in your skin and for this reason Omega3 fats are also very good to improved skin health.
If you’re interested in high quality skin care you need to understand the damaging effects of excessive exposure to sunlight, and that there are ways to help prevent this and also to reverse the effects of skin sun damage.
And you also should be aware that new products are slowly becoming available as science finds out more and more about how to keep their skin healthy and looking good using natural ingredients such as lycopene to help prevent skin sun damage.
If you’d like to source omega 3 supplements which now include lycopene as one of the active ingredients then head over to my website.
Want to learn more about the best Natural Skin Care Products? Or more about Skin Sun Damage? Visit Peter’s Website Natural Health-Natural Skin Care.
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Why Do Women Tan If They Know That It Causes Premature Aging?i?
Posted on February 15th, 2010 2 commentsWhy would you want to take that chance. Id rather be pale then have wrinkly skin at an early age. People on here complain all the time about how they laid out and got wrinkled up in their 30’s and 40’s and yet I am not sure why nobody takes this issue to heart.
It is not good to lay out period. -
What In The World Is Functional Keratin In Skin Care?
Posted on February 13th, 2010 No commentsIf you are interested in researching a little about skin care and skin health it won’t be long before you start to read about the role of keratin in maintaining your skins health. But what is keratin?
Keratin is found right throughout our bodies. It is a protein that is extremely strong and it can be found in the hard areas of our bodies like our nails and also in the softer areas of our bodies, like skin. A lot of keratin is found in our nails, teeth, hair and skin.
In our skin keratin is produced by keratinocytes, a type of skin cell in the epidermis, and this keratin has a role in keeping our skin in good health. As keratin cells come to the surface they die, and form a protective layer on the surface. And these dead cells are shed all the time as dead skin cells.
Keratin has some vital roles in maintaining the function of our skin. It produces some waterproofing qualities, for example. But the main function of keratin in our skin is to promote skin strength and elasticity.
Our skin needs these qualities and as it ages it starts to lose some keratin and so lose some strength and elasticity.
So you would be accurate in assuming that if you use skin care products with keratin in them you are restoring your stores of skin keratin and thereby improving your skin strength and elasticity right? Wrong.
You see the keratin that is used in mainstream skin care products is extracted from the horns and hooves of animals and is extracted using acid and heat. This results in the keratin being denaturalized by a process called hydrolization. Denaturalized simply means that its no longer of use to your skin because its form has been changed.
Now what is functional keratin? It is a form of keratin that has been extracted using a different process other than heat and acid and so isn’t denaturalized. It comes from the wool of sheep and is functional in the sense that it is still in a form that is of use to our skin.
One very small company has only very recently perfected this process and has patented it, and puts the functional keratin into a product called Cynergy TK that is used only in the very best skin care products available.
There have been studies done on the effectiveness of products that include Cynergy TK and the results have been impressive with visible reductions in wrinkles and fine lines, and a improvement in overall skin complexion.
Cynergy TK is expensive, and so the big brand name skin care products don’t use it. But it is possible to get skin care products that contain Cynergy TK, and they aren’t more expensive than other skin care products. Why? Because the big brands spend their budget on advertising, whereas the small niche company spends it’s budget on product quality.
The price of big brand skincare products has to reflect the cost of the advertising.
I hope that’s enlightened you somewhat about what keratin is and what it does for the skin, and what functional keratin is.
I write more about Cynergy TK on my website.
Want to know more about Functional Keratin or find products containing Cynergy TK? Visit Peter’s Website Natural Health-Natural Skin Care.


