Menopause Sweats and Hot Flashes - The Important Things to Know and How to Get Relief

Menopause sweats and hot flashes are one of the first signs that you are approaching menopause.

You know you are beginning to approach menopause when you begin to experience several key symptoms. These symptoms are your best evidence that you are beginning the transition out of your reproductive years and that you have entered perimenopause. These symptoms mean that you are now approaching menopause, the cessation of your menstrual periods.

Transitioning into menopause is a unique experience for each woman. However similarities among women's experiences allow the symptoms of this transition to be categorized into 11 broad categories. These categories are used by researchers to study menopausal symptoms. They are incorporated into an assessment questionnaire called the Menopausal Rating Scale (MRS).

The 11 categories of perimenopausal and menopausal symptoms are:
1) hot flashes (HF) and sweating,
2) heart complaints,
3) sleep disturbances,
4) depressive mood,
5) irritability,
6) anxiety,
7) physical and mental exhaustion,
8) sexual problems,
9) urinary tract complaints
10) vaginal dryness and
11) joint and muscle complaints.

Menopause sweats and other symptoms begin during perimenopause.

Menopausal symptoms begin with perimenopause which usually starts after age 40, but can start as early as age 35. Perimenopause is the time period approaching menopause. At menopause (when your menstrual periods stop) your ovaries stop releasing eggs. The time from when you start having menopausal symptoms until your periods stop can last as little as one to two years, but for most women it lasts an average of five years. The symptoms of menopause often intensify during the two years immediately before menopause. This is when the drop in ovarian hormone secretion speeds up.

Your first clues that you are entering perimenopause:

Hot flashes (HF)

Hot flashes and sweats are the most common and bothersome complaint of women approaching menopause. They frequently begin up to five years before periods stop and can last for another five years after. Nearly 80% of women suffer hot flashes (HF) to some degree during the transition into menopause. 30% of women report HF to be severe enough to significantly disrupt their quality of life. In 10% of women HF are experienced up to ten years after their menstrual periods stop. HF affect 75% of women over age 50.

At the onset, hot flashes often occur just before or during menstrual periods. They can range from mild, to severe and debilitating. They are often described as a sudden wave of heat moving through the body, from the chest to the neck, face and scalp. The skin of the neck and face can flush red. HF can also be experienced across the breasts, below the breasts, or as a surge of heat over the entire body. The wave of heat is generally followed sweating. This sweating can range from light perspiration to heavy sweating and chills. Intense hot flashes may also be associated with a racing heart, tingling in the hands, and nausea.

Night Sweats

Night sweats are an extension of hot flashes (HF), experienced at night while trying to sleep. At the culmination of a HF one begins to perspire. At night time this is experienced as sweating which can be so severe that one wakes up drenched in perspiration. These night time HF tend to disrupt sleep. Problems with sleeping is another symptom of perimenopause and menopause, that may be a direct result of night sweats, sleep problems, fatigue and problems with memory. All of these complaints are thought to be associated with declines in the ovarian hormones estrogen and progesterone. The severity of these complaints seems to be in direct proportion to the severity and frequency of hot flashes.

Natural remedies for menopause sweats and hot flashes

Our current understanding is that menopause sweats and hot flashes are caused by dropping levels of estrogen. Unfortunately hormone replacement therapy--replacing the estrogen that the ovaries are not making--has potentially severe side effects. The two most dangerous are breast cancer and heart disease.

Molecules resembling estrogen in structure and function are also found in nature. These are called phytoestrogens (phyto=plant). That is to say these molecules are found in plants. The phytoestrogens found in plants are not all the same. The type and amount varies from one species of plant to another. Some of these are soy (soy beans, soy products such as tofu), red clover, kudzu, fennel, anise and black cohosh.

Research findings on the effectiveness of herbs containing phytoestrogens varies from herb to herb. For instance black cohosh is used widely for its purported benefits. However while some research studies document its effectiveness, others clearly do not. A recent meta-analysis of the benefit of herbal remedies for relief of night sweats and hot flashes found that on average they provided up to 45% relief.

One herbal remedy for hot flashes and sweats that researchers find more effective than 45% is an extract of Siberian rhubarb root. To date four clinical studies have demonstrated its benefits for virtually all menopausal complaints but particularly hot flashes and night sweats. One study found that Siberian rhubarb root extract relieved hot flashes and sweats by 75% compared to placebo.

Hormone replacement therapy is no longer the option of choice for relief of menopausal complaints. The risk factors associated with HRT are too great for it to be a casual decision. Yet menopause symptoms can be serious enough to significantly disrupt quality of life, and thus must be addressed.

It is important to remember that hormone replacement therapy is a misnomer. What modern medicine calls hormone replacement is not truly that. It is replacing the body's hormones with drugs. In the case of estrogen from pregnant mare's urine (Premarin) it is replacing human estrogens with horse estrogens. No wonder there are side effects. The benefits of real (bio-identical) hormone replacement therapy has yet to be explored by modern medicine. In the meantime menopause sweats and hot flashes can be effectively treated with some newly emerging herbal remedies.