{"id":606401,"date":"2025-12-02T01:43:16","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T01:43:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/606401\/"},"modified":"2025-12-02T01:43:16","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T01:43:16","slug":"why-women-in-menopause-struggle-to-find-doctors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/606401\/","title":{"rendered":"Why women in menopause struggle to find doctors"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"play\"<\/p>\n

Menopause care is lacking, leading to delays in care experts say<\/p>\n

Dr. Stephanie Faubion of the Menopause Society says medical schools need better menopause training to prevent misdiagnosis and improve patient care.<\/p>\n

Julie Andresen couldn\u2019t sleep.<\/p>\n

She was sweating through her pajamas and sheets each night. She was so exhausted that she considered quitting her job of 30 years as a program manager for the city of Phoenix.<\/p>\n

Then came the hot flashes. Her libido felt almost nonexistent. She woke up several times during the night to use the bathroom.<\/p>\n

She met with her doctor and her gynecologist. Both told her that this was normal. The diagnosis? Midlife.<\/p>\n

She saw nine doctors over five years, sometimes waiting more than three months to get an appointment. She was told to ignore the symptoms, and they eventually would go away.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy doctor asked me if I wanted night sweats or if I wanted cancer,\u201d says Andresen, 54, despite no family history of breast cancer. \u201cI felt so awful, everything was so bad, and it felt like no one cared.\u201d<\/p>\n

She finally turned to a gynecologist at a concierge medical practice<\/a> who didn\u2019t take health insurance. Within a week, she was told she was in perimenopause<\/a> and prescribed hormone replacement therapy.<\/p>\n

One year later, her symptoms such as night sweats have gone from 87% of the time to 2%.<\/p>\n

Many women say they feel gaslit, ignored and dismissed by their own doctors. When they say they feel anxious, they are prescribed an antidepressant.<\/a> When they complain of achy joints, they are told to stretch more. When they say that sex is painful, they are told to drink a glass of wine. And those itchy ears? It\u2019s all in their head.<\/p>\n

At a time when menopause is talked about more than ever before and grown into a $20 billion industry that includes everything from herbal supplements promoted by Drew Barrymore<\/a> to cooling bamboo robes, women still struggle to find care.<\/p>\n

One in 5 women go a year<\/a> before a doctor diagnoses her menopause, according to one survey. Another showed that 5% of women seeking help for perimenopause or menopause saw 11 doctors before getting help. Some turn to concierge doctors who don\u2019t take health insurance but specialize in menopause. Others have found relief with women\u2019s telehealth companies. Women say they often have to beg their own doctors to help them.<\/p>\n

While changes are coming, the biggest one with the Food and Drug Administration\u2019s new guidance<\/a> on hormone replacement therapy, women say it\u2019s still not enough. As more doctors get certified in menopause care and some states look to mandate more education for medical students, women still often are left to advocate for their own health in a way that they say never would happen if they were men.<\/p>\n

Visual story: <\/strong>Beyond fertility and menopause, see why the ovary is central to women\u2019s health and longevity<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI was at my wit\u2019s end,\u201d says Andresen, who pays $3,200 a year for access to her specialist. \u201cI couldn\u2019t find anyone to help me, and I was paying so much money going from doctor to doctor. I needed my health back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Welcome to the ‘menodivorce’ <\/strong>Why women aren’t sweating marriage in a sea of hot flashes<\/a><\/p>\n

‘The panic was so real’<\/p>\n

Melissa Gordon noticed that she was gaining weight no matter what she ate.<\/p>\n

Her cholesterol spiked, her blood sugar dropped.<\/p>\n

She met with her doctor and her gynecologist. Both told her she was simply aging.<\/p>\n

She was 38.<\/p>\n

Then came the anxiety, so debilitating she felt her face freeze. One doctor told her it might be multiple sclerosis; another said it was just in her head.<\/p>\n

She saw seven doctors over the past few years before trying a women\u2019s telehealth company. That doctor reviewed her medical history, asked questions and diagnosed her with perimenopause this year. Gordon started hormone replacement therapy and now says she rarely experiences symptoms.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen it was so bad, I felt like I was inside of a video game. The panic was so real,\u201d says Gordon, a marketer and Web designer in Los Angeles. \u201cOnce someone listened to me, it all changed. It was amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Finding a doctor who specializes in menopause can be difficult. General practitioners<\/a> are more likely to prescribe antidepressants than hormone replacement therapy, according to The Menopause Society<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Most doctors \u2013 even gynecologists \u2013 didn\u2019t receive adequate training on menopause during medical school, according to a study in the\u00a0Journal of The Menopause Society.<\/a>\u00a0Less than one-third of the almost 100 obstetrics and gynecology residency program directors recently surveyed said they received training in their residencies.<\/p>\n

The Menopause Society<\/a>, a nonprofit organization that provides resources for health care professionals, certifies providers in menopause care through exams and continuing education. Membership has spiked in the past few years, with more than 4,000 certified physicians to pharmacists, up from 1,000 a decade ago.<\/p>\n

It recently launched a $10 million training program to help train more than 25,000 health care workers in menopause and perimenopause.<\/p>\n

Telehealth, which exploded during COVID, also is stepping in. From Midi<\/a> to Alloy<\/a>, Winona<\/a> to Evernow<\/a>, women\u2019s telehealth companies are varied, with some companies taking insurance, and others that offer their own medicine and supplements.<\/p>\n

Midi began in 2021 when Kathleen Jordan<\/a>, a physician, hit midlife and saw so many friends struggling to find appropriate care.<\/p>\n

She shared the women\u2019s frustration. Their clinicians ignored their concerns. There weren\u2019t menopause specialists near them. And many women couldn\u2019t afford a concierge menopause doctor.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery woman should have access to good menopause care,\u201d says Jordan, the chief medical officer and cofounder of Midi, a women\u2019s telehealth company. \u201cThe most common comment after a Midi visit is \u2018I finally felt heard.\u2019 They\u2019re not being given the time that they deserve.\u201d<\/p>\n

Perimenopause and menopause care not only can relieve women of symptoms such as brain fog, frozen shoulder and urinary incontinence, but can determine their health in their older years.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor too long we\u2019ve expected OB-GYNs to do all of women\u2019s health, but they can\u2019t do it alone,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Take our menopause survey <\/strong>Let us know how you are doing and help make our reporting better by sharing your stories.<\/a><\/p>\n

‘I felt like I was going crazy’<\/p>\n

Loredana Buonopane didn\u2019t feel like herself.<\/p>\n

She was anxious, struggled to sleep and felt as if her emotions were out of control.<\/p>\n

She met with her general practitioner and a few gynecologists. Each told her that because she still had a menstrual cycle, she wasn\u2019t in menopause and didn\u2019t need hormone replacement therapy. One told her that taking estrogen was dangerous.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt like I was going crazy,\u201d says Buonopane, 50, a stylist who also owns a vintage shop. \u201cI kept thinking, how can I even keep my job when I feel like this.\u201d<\/p>\n

She struggled to find a new doctor that took insurance and finally found one more than an hour from her New Jersey home. That doctor put her on an antidepressant, which while approved to treat some perimenopause symptoms such as hot flashes, isn\u2019t as effective as hormone replacement therapy.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201cIt helps a little,\u201d says Buonopane, who is in perimenopause, the time preceding menopause. \u201cBut it\u2019s not what I need.\u201d<\/p>\n

The new FDA guidelines direct drug companies to remove the black box warnings on hormone replacement therapy\u00a0drugs containing estrogen<\/a>. This change is monumental in helping more women manage disruptive menopause and perimenopause symptoms, ranging from increased urinary tract infections to night sweats.<\/p>\n

For more than 20 years, the warning has kept many women away from hormone replacement therapy after a 2002\u00a0Women\u2019s Health Initiative study<\/a>\u00a0linked it to a higher of breast cancer, heart attacks and strokes in postmenopausal women. The risks, recognized later, were mostly found in women who were older when they\u00a0started hormone therapy<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The study’s ramifications affected millions of women, with the use of hormone replacement therapy dropping from 40% to 5% in the past 20 years as many doctors stopped prescribing it, and even if they did, women were reluctant to take it.<\/p>\n

Menopause doctors say removing the label doesn\u2019t change the risk but will help more physicians better understand them.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like we have to do all of the research ourselves and then try to convince a doctor to listen to us,\u201d Buonopane says. \u201cIt\u2019s shocking to me to reach this age and not be able to get help.\u201d<\/p>\n

Capitalizing on women’s health<\/p>\n

Menopause has become big business, with\u00a0more than 40%<\/a>\u00a0of U.S. women in perimenopause, menopause or are postmenopausal. And most women are in worse health during menopause, which can last\u00a0one-third of women\u2019s lives<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201cEveryone is trying to capitalize on it,\u201d says Monica Christmas<\/a>, a physician and associate medical director of the Menopause Society. \u201cIt makes it not only harder for women but practitioners.\u201d<\/p>\n

Christmas sees hope in the increased interest with an explosion in menopause books and influencers. But, she says, it also makes some women think that hormone replacement therapy is the answer to all medical issues for women in midlife.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith many of these things. It\u2019s difficult to untangle what\u2019s due to menopause and what\u2019s due to chronological aging,\u201d she says. \u201cMetabolism changes happen with age. Hormone replacement therapy is not a magic jellybean that is going to make us young again or stave off the aging process.\u201d<\/p>\n

She was prescribed antidepressants. <\/strong>But she was in menopause and needed another drug.<\/a><\/p>\n

‘My health is worth it’<\/p>\n

As the founder of the Menopause Clinic at Brigham and Women\u2019s Hospital in Boston, physician Heather Hirsch<\/a> saw around 18 women a day.<\/p>\n

There wasn\u2019t enough time to listen to them.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy the time a woman gets to perimenopause, they want to tell you about endometriosis, their period, having babies and even divorce,\u201d says the author of \u201cThe Perimenopause Survival Guide.<\/a>” \u201cThe trauma of being a woman encompasses not just reproductive health but so much else.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s because perimenopause and menopause symptoms can be so varied that women often seek advice from a dermatologist for their dry skin, a neurologist for their brain fog, an OB-GYN for vaginal dryness, and a general practitioner for high cholesterol.<\/p>\n

Now that she runs The Collaborative<\/a>, a concierge practice, she sees fewer than half that number a day.<\/p>\n

For Andresen, the concierge model just made sense.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was spending so much money seeing so many doctors before hitting my deductible,\u201d she said. \u201cThis was really my last resort.\u201d<\/p>\n

She likes the personal attention from her doctor, noting that her first appointment was more than an hour. But she also likes the education offered. She\u2019s watched more than eight hours of videos on menopause and rattles off statistics like a doctor.<\/p>\n

Now she shares this valuable and hard-earned knowledge with friends and even wrote a letter to the FDA this summer to advocate for better treatment options for women.<\/p>\n

Her health is worth it.<\/p>\n

Do you have a menopause story to tell? <\/strong>We want to hear from our readers.<\/a><\/p>\n

Laura Trujillo is a national columnist focusing on health and wellness. She is the author of “Stepping Back from the Ledge: A Daughter’s Search for Truth and Renewal,” and can be reached at ltrujillo@usatoday.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Menopause care is lacking, leading to delays in care experts say Dr. Stephanie Faubion of the Menopause Society…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":606402,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5311],"tags":[6580,5784,5176,35745,6579,1203,105,5778,3462,12639,4554,6593,6584,12,107768,5179,6591,6586,1017,6587,5181,49,978,659,2488,20296,6795],"class_list":{"0":"post-606401","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-administration","9":"tag-affiliate","10":"tag-and","11":"tag-christmas","12":"tag-drug","13":"tag-food","14":"tag-health","15":"tag-literature","16":"tag-local","17":"tag-local-affiliate-health-and-wellness","18":"tag-medical","19":"tag-medical-literature-u0026-resources","20":"tag-negative","21":"tag-news","22":"tag-obgyn","23":"tag-overall","24":"tag-overall-negative","25":"tag-resources","26":"tag-u-s","27":"tag-u-s-food-and-drug-administration","28":"tag-u0026","29":"tag-united-states","30":"tag-us","31":"tag-usa","32":"tag-wellness","33":"tag-womens","34":"tag-womens-health"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115647442007996793","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=606401"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606401\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/606402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=606401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=606401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=606401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}