Menopause
Menopause symptoms don’t have to affect your quality of life.
Menopause is a word every woman has heard, but it’s not always something widely discussed, and detailed knowledge can sometimes be a little sparse. Sadly, this often leads to embarrassment among women when it comes time to discuss gynaecological health issues with their doctor. As a result, many women suffer the symptoms of menopause in silence and consider it part of a woman’s natural development.
It is estimated that 40% of postmenopausal women experience symptoms related to vaginal atrophy, but that only one quarter of these women seek medical help.
What is Menopause?
Derived from the Greek words ‘menos’ and ‘pausis’ (or month and stop), menopause defines the time in a woman’s life when she stops menstruating. Eggs are no longer released and her monthly dose of hormones levels out.
Menopause has a warning period called menopausal transition, or perimenopause, where periods may become irregular and hot flushes and night sweats may occur. Perimenopause can start 5-10 years before a woman’s final period and officially ends a year after their final period, marking the beginning of menopause.
What age does menopause start?
Each woman is different and much like when she began puberty, the age she begins menopause at depends on her hormones. Generally speaking, menopause will occur between ages 48 and 55 with the average menopausal age for Australian women being 51. However, the build up to menopause actually begins much earlier, roughly around age 40, when levels of oestrogen and progesterone hormones start to decline, changing the frequency or flow of periods. This marks the beginning of perimenopause.
What is early menopause?
Early menopause is when women reach the menopausal stage (after perimenopause) between the ages of 40 and 45, roughly 10 years prior to when menopause should occur. Early menopause only affects around 1% of women and typically occurs due to factors such as chemotherapy, surgery, or a family history of early menopause.
How long does menopause last?
On average, menopause symptoms may last 2-10 years from the start of menopause (after perimenopause), and it is not uncommon for postmenopausal symptoms to continue for an extended period of time.
Menopause with Dr Ljiljana
Experiencing menopause can be hard to deal with and it can have a devastating impact on your emotional health. If you are finding that your experience is affecting your mental and emotional health, it’s important to seek help. Dr Ljiljana understands the emotional impact that menopause can have and may suggest counselling to help you process your emotions.
Menopause Symptoms
Most women will experience some symptoms of menopause, with the severity and duration depending on the woman. The most common symptoms of menopause include:
- Hot flushes—a sudden feeling of heat, often around the face or neck
- Night sweats—waking up in a sweat, leading to disrupted sleep
- Altered sleep patterns due to hormonal changes
- Menstrual irregularities, either unusually heavy or lighter periods and possible spotting between cycles
- Thinner and dryer vaginal walls due to decreased oestrogen levels (this is called vaginal atrophy)
- Painful sex from vaginal atrophy
- Sudden mood changes, such as feeling depressed or anxious
- Increased urinary tract infections (UTIs)
- A need to urinate frequently
- Sudden weight changes
- Unexplained aches and pains
Other symptoms can include headaches, reduction of muscle mass, stiffness, osteoporosis (weakening of the bones), and metabolic changes which can increase the risk of cardiovascular disease. If you think you might be experiencing menopausal symptoms, there are a number of tests that can confirm the early signs of menopause.
Diagnosing Menopause
There are a variety of methods that Dr Ljiljana uses to diagnose menopause, including:
- Taking your family history, medical history, and conducting a physical examination
- Ruling out other causes for absent or irregular periods
- Tests for other conditions, such as autoimmune diseases or genetic conditions that can cause early menopause
- Blood tests to measure hormone levels
Managing Menopause
Dr Ljiljana understands the discomfort that menopause symptoms can cause and wants to work with you to help you find relief. Managing menopausal symptoms includes menopausal hormone therapy (MHT), lifestyle changes, behavioural modifications, and other treatments.
Menopausal Hormone Therapy (MHT)
MHT involves taking, in different forms, oestrogen, progesterone, and sometimes testosterone to help relieve hot flushes, reduce vaginal dryness and recurrent UTIs, improve sex drive, and counteract osteoporosis. MHT can also reduce the risk of bowel cancer; however, it can slightly raise your chances of developing other conditions. Dr Ljiljana will discuss these with you should you mutually decide MHT is the best course of action for you.
Dr Ljiljana Difference
Dr Ljiljana knows that women tend to prioritise the needs of everyone else before their own, which means their health concerns are often overlooked. This is why Dr Ljiljana takes her time listening to you and understanding how you wish to be treated. She then applies her skills and expertise to provide the best possible care with positive outcomes.