Perimenopause and your heart!

Last week I wrote about the importance of supporting bone density with age and the transition into menopause. Another very important system to consider as we age is the cardiovascular system - heart health!  

Cardiovascular disease is one the leading causes of death and illness in women.  

Estrogen is very supportive to cardiovascular health, so as production stops, we see risk factors for cardiovascular disease increasing. 

From a dietary and lifestyle perspective we have a lot of research on the benefits of exercise and the Mediterranean style diet in terms of supporting heart health. There are other factors we also want to consider. We know that high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and high blood sugar can all increase that risk significantly.

I prefer for all of my patients to be screened for blood sugar, cholesterol and blood pressure in their early 40s. If there are concerns at this age, we want to start treatment to decrease that risk over time. If cholesterol was theoretically just high for one day, that would not cause problems. 

The problem with cholesterol is that if it's elevated for years, it's going to increase the risk of plaque build-up in the arteries. Similar to blood pressure and blood sugar. It’s long-term elevations that are a problem.

We also want to test for these things at this age to have a baseline so that when estrogen drops in menopause, we know how much it’s impacting these systems and may consider interventions sooner.

High blood pressure, high cholesterol, and elevated blood sugar don't necessarily cause symptoms, meaning you won’t know if they are a problem without testing. It is much easier to support these systems if we begin interventions sooner.

While these symptoms are absolutely impacted by dietary and lifestyle changes, genetics play a large role as well; you can be doing all of the right things and still have trouble with cholesterol, blood pressure, blood sugar; this is again why we want to test!

Knowing this information helps to inform, motivate, and determine health priorities!