Can drinking soy milk increase estrogen in the body when women are estrogen deficient?
Before we tell you the answer, let’s take a look at the conditions in which a woman’s body can be truly deficient in estrogen.
Estrogen deficiency states mainly occur in
The most common is the menopausal transition and menopause, when ovarian function begins to decline and gradually transitions to ovarian depletion. Ovarian production of estrogen and progesterone also begins to decrease until they basically disappear after menopause.
When these conditions occur after the age of 40, they are the transitional and menopausal phases of menopause. If it occurs before the age of 40, it is generally referred to as early-onset ovarian insufficiency or premature ovarian failure.
Whether it is menopause or premature ovarian failure, estrogen deficiency can cause similar symptoms. These include hot flashes and night sweats, joint pain, anxiety and poor sleep that make you uncomfortable, irritability and irritability that make others uncomfortable, vaginal dryness and tingling during intercourse that make couples disharmonious, etc. If estrogen deficiency lasts for a long time, it will also cause cardiovascular loss of protection and make you prone to cardiovascular diseases, such as stroke and heart attack; there is also a high risk of osteoporosis and Alzheimer’s disease.
Can I drink soy milk for estrogen supplementation?
As an important member of the traditional Chinese diet, it’s one of the four giants of Shanghainese breakfast: soy milk! It is also En’s favorite, and he drinks two big bags of it for breakfast every day.
However, what is contained in soy milk is not estrogen, but phytoestrogen. Although there are just two more words, the two are completely different ingredients, so drinking soy milk does not raise the estrogen level in your body. Otherwise, the two big bags of Engo go down every morning and have long since become sexual.
Phytoestrogens is a general term for a large class of compounds that includes soy isoflavones including genistein, soy glycosides, and resveratrol, which is rich in wine.
In addition to soy milk, which contains more phytoestrogens, various beans, soy flour and soy products such as tofu have more phytoestrogen content. These are all common ingredients in our daily Chinese diet.
Since soy milk does not raise estrogen, can it still treat perimenopausal symptoms?
It has always seemed that people prefer traditional or natural things and always feel that hormonal drugs are bad for this and that. Therefore, the people and many doctors are also trying to find an alternative to hormones for the treatment of perimenopausal syndrome.
Phytoestrogens, because of their closer structure to estrogen, can partially perform the same effects as estrogen in the human body. Therefore, it has been chosen as an alternative to estrogen and a lot of research has been done. Let’s see what the results of these studies say about.
1. Hot flashes and night sweats: The international menopause journal Climacteric and the Journal of the American Medical Association JAMA published high-quality meta-analysis articles in 2015 and 2016, respectively, and the summary data analysis endorsed that phytoestrogens can relieve hot flashes to some extent, but are of little use for night sweats.
2. Vaginal dryness: Also in the JAMA 2016 article, the pooled data analysis also recognized that phytoestrogens can improve mild to moderate vaginal dryness symptoms.
3. Osteoporosis: Long-standing research studies have concluded that phytoestrogens have a protective effect on bone quality in East Asians because East Asians eat more soy products. But real clinical research projects have had mixed results, with some saying phytoestrogens are good and some saying they are not.
But in 2017 The American journal of clinical nutrition also published a meta-analysis with clinical data from over 2,700 people showing that isoflavones increase bone density in the lumbar spine and femur. The improvement is even more pronounced if the active form of isoflavones is sapogenins.
4. Cardiovascular events: Many studies support that soy products can protect the cardiovascular system, but it is the soy protein in soy products, not the phytoestrogens, that play a role here. However, there is nothing to worry about as they are all eaten together with soy products anyway.
The effect of phytoestrogens on other symptoms of perimenopausal syndrome may not be very clear. So, if you have uncomfortable manifestations that happen to be treated by phytoestrogens and are not very severe, this is an alternative option.
Will taking phytoestrogens give birth to cancer?
1. Breast cancer: Most existing epidemiological studies and clinical studies have confirmed that phytoestrogens can reduce the risk of breast cancer to some extent, and this effect is more obvious if you have been eating more soy products since childhood. a meta-analysis published in PLoS One in 2014 showed that eating more soy products can reduce the risk of breast cancer by nearly 40%. For those who have had breast cancer, phytoestrogens can also reduce the risk of recurrence and mortality.
2. Endometrial cancer: In a clinical study of more than 1,600 people in Shanghai, women who routinely ate soy products had a lower risk of developing endometrial cancer. Other clinical studies also support that phytoestrogens do not increase the risk of endometrial cancer.
As for other side effects, there are more or less. However, compared to other drugs, phytoestrogens do not increase the rate of side effects, as confirmed by the results of a meta-analysis that pooled the results of more than 9,000 cases.
Finally, it is important to emphasize that estrogen and progestin supplementation is the best treatment
Currently, our first clinical recommendation is to use natural or naturally derived estrogens and progestins for the treatment of symptoms associated with estrogen deficiency in humans.
These natural hormones, which have little to no detrimental effect on the breast and uterine lining, are a good solution to the problems caused by estrogen deficiency. It is recommended to be treated with confidence under the guidance of a professional doctor.
Summing up
Phytoestrogens, not as the first recommended treatment option, are chosen for the relief of mild to moderate symptoms only when the patient has contraindications to hormones or strongly refuses to use them. If drinking soy milk, insist on drinking 2 cups of 200ml per day.