Sexual Health

Is low-dose vaginal estrogen therapy for all menopausal women? Like for every prescription drug, there is group of women who should not use vaginal estrogen. Some of the contraindications include:

1. Women without a prescription

2. Women with undiagnosed vaginal or uterine bleeding

3. Those with cancers that are estrogen-dependent

4. Those with an increased risk of thrombosis or forming clots, liver disease and pregnancy (of course)

TRANSCRIPT

Vaginal discomfort, painful intercourse, feeling the urge to pee all the time, waking up at night to pee, recurrent UTIs…these are some of the symptoms of the genitourinary syndrome of menopause (GSM)

All of these symptoms are caused by one central event - the lack of estrogen in these tissues. So what if instead of lubricants and moisturizers which only take care of the symptoms on the surface, we take care of the root cause of the problem by adding some estrogen back into the vagina? 

So if you are someone for whom vaginal lubricants and moisturizers aren’t working out or someone who has urinary symptoms, there is absolutely no reason for you to suffer. Under the supervision of your physician, you can get started on a low-dose vaginal estrogen prescription and it can take care of your symptoms. But please remember, vaginal estrogen is a prescription drug and…

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, and welcome to MenopauseWize. I am Dr. Sukhpreet Patel, an MD ObGyn, a Menopausal Health advocate, a Post Menopausal woman, and the founder of MenopauseWize. And this session is all about how to read the fine print on personal or vaginal lubricants so that you can choose the one that's right for you!

And before we get started on lubes please spend a few minutes reading the disclaimer by pausing this video.

Now, starting at perimenopause, declining levels of estrogen create some unfavorable changes in the vagina leading to vaginal dryness. And a decrease in natural vaginal secretions increases friction during intercourse leading to painful sex. And so, it sounds logical that using a lubricant during intercourse should take care of this problem. But the question is which one?

There are 3 types of vaginal lubricants - Water soluble, silicon-based, and oil-based and this information is available on…

So, what's the bottom line for vaginal moisturizers?

One can choose between commercially available ones or natural oils to regularly hydrate the vagina - just like we moisturize our hands and body.

The advantage of natural oils is that they are "Natural" so despite limited research on them, it seems less likely that they could do any serious harm as compared to the ones available in the market that usually contain 5 to 10 different ingredients that we don't know much about.

The disadvantages of using pure oils are that they may require daily application, they can be messy, and if you are perimenopausal it is important to remember that they are not latex-safe. So, you cannot rely on condoms for protection.

In contrast, commercially available vaginal moisturizers have the advantage of being less messy and need to be used only 2-3 times a week, especially those that contain hyaluronic…