What No One Told You About Estrogen

Women are led to believe that menopause is a time of decreasing estrogen. And although that may be true in one sense, it's not completely true. Estradiol (E2) is the main hormone that is made during a woman's reproductive life. And it is true that E2 declines during menopause. But women make at least two other kinds of estrogen. Pregnant women make estriol (E3), but women make little E3 at any other time. After menopause, women mostly produce estrone (E1), which is 10x less potent than E2 so even if total estrogen remains stable, E1 simply doesn't work as well as E2. Too many doctors check a woman's "estrogen" level to determine whether she could benefit from menopausal hormone therapy (MHT) and determine how much she should be prescribed, but as is now more clear, total estrogen is a poor indicator.

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