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Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS)

The most common cause of infertility in the United States today is polycystic ovary syndrome. PCOS is a metabolic condition promoted with insulin and testosterone elevations that disrupt pituitary feedback loop coordination. Insulin resistance appears to play a major role in the development of PCOS.

Insulin resistance leads to Androgen Dominance

Androgen Dominance leads to PCOS

How does traditional medicine treat polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS)?

There is no successful treatment for PCOS in traditional medicine (TM) because they do not treat the root cause of PCOS. Traditional medicine treatment goals are based on your symptoms, whether or not you want to become pregnant, and lowering your chances of getting heart disease and diabetes.

Functional Medicine involves understanding a complex series of vicious cycles that feed each other occurring with PCOS in your body.

Then identify and provide structural and nutritional support and education to unlock these vicious cycles to prevent their reoccurrence.

Wellness Alternatives knowledge of specialties include Bio-identical Hormones; Integrated Functional Medicine; Sacro Occipital Technique, Craniopathy; Functional Endocrinology and Blood Chemistry, using state of the art Saliva and Blood Lab Testing enables us to determine treatment and/or nutrition protocols specific for your needs.

Wellness Alternatives understands and recognizes the vicious cycles occurring with PCOS. The reason why Wellness Alternatives chooses to take a different approach is listed below each of the traditional medicine (TM) treatments for PCOS.

Birth control pills.

TM For women who don't want to become pregnant, birth control pills can control menstrual cycles, reduce male hormone levels, and help to clear acne. However, the menstrual cycle will become abnormal again if the pill is stopped. Women may also think about taking a pill that only has progesterone, like Provera®, to control the menstrual cycle but this increases the risk of endometrial cancer. Progesterone alone does not help reduce acne and hair growth.

WA Attempting to manage PCOS hormonally if blood sugar and adrenal disorders are not managed will be futile. Combined with "Post-birth-control-pill syndrome" in which women lose their hypothalamus-pituitary-ovarian (HPO) feedback loop coordination from long term use of birth control pills. It is little wonder why traditional treatments are ineffective.

Diabetes medications

TM The medicine metformin (Glucophage®) is used to treat type 2 diabetes. It also has been found to help with PCOS symptoms, although it is not FDA-approved for this use. Metformin affects the way insulin controls blood glucose (sugar) and lowers testosterone production. Abnormal hair growth will slow down, and ovulation may return after a few months of use.

WA Insulin resistance precedes diabetes. Wellness Alternatives recommends going directly to the cause of the problem - Insulin resistance. There is conflicting information as to whether diabetes medication will drive a person into diabetes if they don't actually have diabetes.

Fertility medications

TM Lack of ovulation is usually the reason for fertility problems in women with PCOS. Several medications that stimulate ovulation can help women with PCOS become pregnant. Even so, other reasons for infertility in both the woman and man should be ruled out before fertility medications are used. Also, there is an increased risk for multiple births (twins, triplets) with fertility medications.

WA Insulin resistance creates a vicious cycle that shifts into androgen excess and the androgen excess promotes insulin resistance. This condition presents with elevated testosterone, elevated estrogen, decreased sex-hormone binding globulin (SHBG), increased Androstenedione, increased DHEA, increased 17-hydroxprogesterone and increased LH. These elevated hormone levels contribute to the lack of ovulation.

Medicine for increased hair growth or extra male hormones.

TM Medicines called anti-androgens may reduce hair growth and clear acne. Spironolactone (speer-on-oh-lak-tone) (Aldactone®), first used to treat high blood pressure, has been shown to reduce the impact of male hormones on hair growth in women. Finasteride (Propecia®), a medicine taken by men for hair loss, has the same effect. Anti-androgens often are combined with oral contraceptives.

WA The sex hormones (testosterone & estrogen) circulate in the bloodstream, bound mostly to SHBG and to some degree bound to serum albumin. Only a small fraction is unbound, or "free," and thus biologically active and able to enter a cell and activate its receptor. The SHBG inhibits the function of these hormones. Thus bioavailability of sex hormones is influenced by the level of SHBG.

Insulin resistance causes decreased sex hormone binding globulin (SHBG). Decreased SHBG increases the bioavailability and greater exposure to both estrogens and testosterone leading to an even greater androgen response causing the increased hair growth and extra male hormones.

The use of hormones in combination with the already altered hormone feedback loops caused by insulin resistance and poor liver detoxification compounds the problem of unwanted hair.

Surgery

TM "Ovarian drilling" is a surgery that brings on ovulation. It is sometimes used when a woman does not respond to fertility medicines. The doctor makes a very small cut above or below the navel and inserts a small tool that acts like a telescope into the abdomen. This is called laparoscopy. The doctor then punctures the ovary with a small needle carrying an electric current to destroy a small portion of the ovary. This procedure carries a risk of developing scar tissue on the ovary. This surgery can lower male hormone levels and help with ovulation. But these effects may only last a few months. This treatment doesn't help with loss of scalp hair and increased hair growth on other parts of the body.

WA Inflammation not only predisposes a person to insulin resistance but it also causes poor connective tissue repair. Structural imbalances in the pelvis cause the ligaments suspending the reproductive organs from the pelvis to alter the shape of the female reproductive organs. The body will also create scar tissue to support the instability, thus impairing proper circulation and function of the reproductive organs.

Wellness Alternatives uses Sacro Occipital Therapy to balance the pelvis and nutritional support to reduce inflammation, repair insulin resistance and rebalance hormone metabolism.

Lifestyle modification.

TM Many women with PCOS are overweight or obese. Many women are eating a low calorie, low fat diet and still cannot lose weight. Many are also exercising and cannot lose weight. At Wellness Alternatives , we see many women who are not over weight with PCOS.

It seems so simple to say: Keep a healthy weight by eating healthy foods and exercise is another way women can help manage PCOS. Eat fewer processed foods and foods with added sugars and more whole-grain products, fruits, vegetables, and lean meats to help lower blood sugar (glucose) levels, improve the body's use of insulin, and normalize hormone levels in your body.

WA With the effects of Insulin Resistance it can be almost impossible to lose weight no matter how dedicated and diligent a women is in diet and exercise. As you can see in the diagram at the top of the page, in insulin resistance causes increased estrogen. Increased estrogen does a couple of things. 1. makes more fat - fat makes more estrogen. 2. Increased estrogen lowers thyroid function making it impossible to lose weight. Until the insulin resistance and estrogen/thryoid metabolism is corrected weight loss will seem futile.

Are you ready to stop the vicious cycles of PCOS?

Call Wellness Alternatives today 636-227-4949

Insulin Resistance and PCOS

Insulin resistance plays a major role in a vicious cycle that alters female hormone metabolism towards androgen dominance. Androgen is the generic term for any steroid hormone that stimulates or controls the development and maintenance of masculine characteristics. They are also the precursor of all estrogens, the female sex hormones. Androgen Dominance may eventually lead into PMS, Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS), endometriosis, ovarian cysts and tumors. PCOS is the most common female hormone disorder in menstruating women. PCOS is primarily characterized by hyperandrogenism, insulin resistance and chronic menstrual irregularities. Estrone is produced by the fat cells from the conversion of the androgens. This type of estrogen promotes the storage of fat around the middle.

Symptoms of androgen disorders tend to appear gradually over a number of years and range from mild to serious. They include:

irregular periods
infertility
unexplained weight gain
fluid retention, fatigue
mood swings
acne beyond puberty
hair loss
unwanted hair growth

Insulin resistance is associated with estrogen proliferative cancers, acanthosis nigricans (darkening of the skin, age or liver spots), increased cardiovascular disease and elevated cholesterol / triglyceride levels.

Insulin resistance causes high cholesterol/triglycerides and sludge to build up in the liver, which must be cleared to restore proper hormone elimination. Cholesterol and triglycerides is a by product of your body’s efforts to provide your cells with glucose. Only 15% of cholesterol and triglycerides levels are related to diet. Androgen dominance plays a role in the vicious cycles in its impact on insulin resistance. Excess androgens increase levels of free fatty acids which inhibit the liver detoxification and skeletal muscles from using glucose. These metabolic pathways create a vicious cycle of elevated insulin which is fed and feeds androgen formation.

Insulin resistance and androgen dominance seriously impair your body’s ability to eliminate toxins, free radical and excess hormones. This results in ever increasing levels in your body of the things that your body is attempting to get rid of.