Hi Terry.
Given how surprised doctors were when the combination synthetic progesterone/estrogen turned out not to be a good idea, when it comes to hormones (synthetic or otherwise) they have not yet done their homework on endocrinology as it relates to much of anything other than thyroid disease or diabetes.
Until there are endocrinologists who have studied the endocrine system in relation to more than the thyroid or the pancreas sitting on each one of our tumor boards, those who prescribe cancer treatment are not taking the endocrine influence on cancers and cancer's influence on the endocrine system seriously.
Just prior to doing treatment, I asked my well-known oncologist whether it would be okay for me to use "bioidentical" progesterone throughout treatment. (It is possible that his answer was based specifically on my diagnosis and not the many others here, and I am HER2+++, ER+ and PR+.) He said using it would be fine, and that it can help some to sleep better. I asked him if using DHEA would be okay and he said no (the theory being that DHEA can break down into androgens and then estrogens). I have no idea whether he knew what he was talking about. Until the results of the testosterone trial I was in a few years later came out, it was widely believed that use of even low-dose testosterone might cause increased levels of estrogen, which the trial results indicated was not the case.
AlaskaAngel
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