https://www.telegraph.co.uk/health-fitness/body/menopause-medic-stars-should-take-hrt-forever/Dr. Louise Newson has heard hundreds of upsetting stories from women who have struggled during the perimenopause and menopause
Two years ago, when I first heard the term perimenopause, I had to explain what it meant every time I used it. Now this word, which defines something every woman goes through, is part of conversations in Westminster’s corridors of power and on the to-do list of every corporate HR and PR department. Global beauty companies are falling over themselves to include it on new products and celebrities such as Meg Mathews and Louise Minchin are sharing their stories of night sweats, anxiety and brain fog.
The menopause has finally gone mainstream. And for that we’ve probably got Dr Louise Newson to thank. She is the UK’s leading perimenopause and menopause specialist, whose black book of patients includes Davina McCall and Lorraine Kelly, and other VIP movers and shakers across all industries. Her private Stratford-upon-Avon surgery is the now largest specialist menopause clinic in the world with an 10,000 strong waiting list.
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The spirited mum-of-three has become Generation X’s feisty female superhero, our authority on a taboo subject which has been scandalously ignored for decades. Her new book, Preparing For the Perimenopause and Menopause is published this week and serialised in The Telegraph on Monday.
“This area of healthcare is a continuing car crash for women,” she says. “It affects every single one of us, 51 per cent of the population, yet so little of what we need has been delivered.”
I first met Newson just over two years ago. I was on my knees with sleep deprivation, I’d suffered uncharacteristic panic attacks, was overwhelmed with a violent rage and my short-term memory was shot to pieces. One morning I forgot which side of the road to drive on and concluded I had developed early onset dementia. I had been to my GP twice and been told I was too young to be in menopause, and offered antidepressants which I didn’t want to take. In the end I started to investigate what was going on myself, and all roads led to Dr Newson.
Dr Newsom's black book of patients includes Davina McCall and Lorraine Kelly CREDIT: Joe Maher/WireImage ///// Dave Benett/Getty Images
As Newson explained to me, there are hormone receptors in every part of your body. So when your hormones are fluctuating wildly, as they do when you age, it causes a myriad of reactions, different for every woman. Menopause is the year after your last period – the average age is 51 in the UK – but at 48, I was in perimenopause. The more I learned, the more livid I became, as I realised all my friends were going through something similar and being told nothing. All of us had been offered antidepressants by our GPs.
Newson prescribed Hormone Replacement Therapy and within six weeks I was back to normal. All the symptoms had gone, and more importantly I was taking a combination of hormones which would decrease my chances of developing osteoporosis and would help protect me from heart disease, different cancers and dementia.
“This is a story I hear hundreds and hundreds of times,” says Newson, 51. “I have seen and spoken to thousands of women on the verge of major life breakdowns. Women give up jobs, walk away from long marriages; these stories are heart-breaking. One of my first ever patients at the clinic had written her suicide note before she came to see me.
“The problem is there are so many symptoms of perimenopause, you’ve really got to join the dots on what is going on.”
Dr Newson began her career in hospital medicine and became an NHS GP after marrying her urologist husband Paul. Their daughters are now aged 10, 16 and 18. She began to focus on menopause 15 years ago when she noted how exceptionally well women responded to HRT. Doctors, however, were reluctant to prescribe it following research – later shown to be flawed – linking a form of HRT with breast cancer.
“I was a medical pariah for a bit,” she recalls. “GPs back then were extremely fearful of prescribing HRT and also simply not well trained or empathetic enough to see what women were going through as they aged. But once I saw the link I couldn’t unsee it.
“I persevered because the stories of what women were going through were so upsetting to me.”
Her passion is drawn from personal experience, too – in her mid forties, she began to experience perimenopausal symptoms yet struggled to diagnose it in herself. “I couldn’t sleep, I was hot and anxious all the time, I was furious with my husband and I had absolutely no libido. My marriage was in danger, frankly, and I was shouting at my kids every day.
“I kept forgetting things and became increasingly worried about my ability to work. I was treating patients and writing about perimenopause all the time and yet even I failed to see the symptoms I was experiencing – that is how broken your brain feels during perimenopause. I couldn’t function – it was one of my daughters who asked if I was hormonal and then I had a light bulb moment and took myself off to get HRT.”
After trying to become a menopause specialist in the NHS, but finding it “impossible”, she set up a private clinic.
This was after the 2015 NICE guidelines had been released confirming Body Identical HRT should be the frontline treatment for symptoms of perimenopause and menopause. The guidelines also advocated the long term protective qualities of HRT, yet still now many GPs don’t recognise perimenopause well enough to confidently prescribe what is a cheap medicine.
There are 13 million menopausal women in the UK, yet many of those who seek help for their symptoms are mistakenly prescribed antidepressants. According to the most recent research, the risk of breast cancer associated with taking today’s Body Identical HRT is less than that of drinking two glasses of wine a day. Other lifestyle factors carry a similar or greater risk – obesity, for example, doubles your risk of breast cancer. Yet only one in 10 women today takes HRT and only one third of women visit their GP to get support for menopause symptoms.
“We have a long road ahead getting this situation sorted,” Newson tells me, “But the difference now is that people are listening to what I’m saying.”
Newson is determined all women have access to this vital information, and has just launched The Menopause Charity which aims to offer free medical advice. “It is down to us to educate ourselves on the perimenopause and menopause, to help medics help us. If GPs get the prescription right and are also aware of the lifestyle changes which may help some women then it takes a huge future burden off the health service.”
She advocates women who benefit from HRT staying on it indefinitely. “The average duration of menopausal symptoms is around 7 to 10 years but so many women suffer for decades.
“The benefits outweigh the risks of HRT and for most types of Body Identical HRT, which are prescribed by the NHS, there are no risks.”
She is delighted that the menopause is finally getting the attention it deserves, with a flurry of podcasts, books and documentaries, and politicians such as Carolyn Harris calling for vital changes in legislation, including making HRT free in England (as it is in Wales and Scotland).
“There is an army of women out there ready to grasp this wonderful stage of life with energy and passion but the perimenopause is stopping them. And I am not going to let that happen anymore.”
Preparing for the Perimenopause and Menopause by Dr Louise Newson is published on Thursday 26th August (£9.99). Buy from Thursday for £8.99 at books.telegraph.co.uk or call 0844 871 1514
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