Rotterdam, Netherlands—A new study published inJAMA suggests that several plant-based ingredients may help women going through menopause.
A team of researchers from Erasmus University Medical Center in the Netherlands, the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom and Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston, MA, combed through several medical databases to identify several relevant clinical trials assessing whether plant-based therapies help women with menopause-related hot flashes, night sweats and vaginal dryness. The pool included 62 studies involving 6,653 women.
The Results: Menopause and Plants
The team found that using phytoestrogens helped decrease the number of daily hot flashes and vaginal dryness scores. Phytoestrogens were not seen as effective against night sweats. The team noted that dietary and supplemental soy isoflavones were linked with an improvement in daily hot flashes and vaginal dryness score, while several herbal remedies (but not Chinese medicinal herbs) were associated a decreased frequency of vasomotor symptoms.
The group recommends additional research to further investigate these implications.
Published in WholeFoods Magazine Online, 6/22/16
