Dr Amir Khan is a full-time NHS GP and best-selling author working in inner city Bradford. He is also known as a podcast host, a resident doctor on TV, including for ITV’s Lorraine and Good Morning Britain, and his insightful, practical advice about everything from sleep to menopause has garnered him 1.1 million followers on Instagram.
Here, he shares the seven most common myths he comes across in his work about women’s health in mid-life, explaining how they are wrong and what you need to do instead.
HRT is the best, and only, option
Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) is effective for the management of symptoms of menopause, particularly for specific symptoms like mood issues, hot flushes and poor sleep. We have such easy ways to administer HRT now, too: we’ve moved beyond tablets to patches, creams and gels, which are far more accessible.
But HRT is not the answer for everyone. There’s a group of women who can’t have it if they’ve had oestrogen dependent breast cancer, for example. Then, there are the side-effects like headaches, nausea or breast pain, particularly in the first few weeks. If you are one of the women managing most of their symptoms well through lifestyle factors, you might want to just get specific medications for symptoms like hot flushes. If anxiety is an issue, you can consider medication used to treat generalised anxiety disorder.
