Menopause

4.4. Complementary or alternative therapies

A large market has developed for complementary therapies for the menopause. There is a wide range of herbal medicines and dietary supplements that aim to relieve menopausal symptoms. Acupuncture, homeopathy, chiropractic and foot reflexology are also on the list. But the evidence that any of them are very effective and safe ways of relieving symptoms of the menopause is not convincing.

Complementary therapies for the menopause are very popular [25]. It has been estimated that from 20 to 50 out of every 100 women in the USA (20-50%) use complementary therapies. The majority of women rate them as helpful, because their symptoms reduced while they were using the product [25], [26]. But from a scientific point of view, that is not proof that they work. That is because menopausal symptoms would have gone away for many women even without any treatment at all.

There are so many pieces of advice to women about how they should manage the menopause that we cannot list them all here. Many of these are completely speculative and they have not been systematically studied. We have concentrated here on describing complementary therapies that have been studied in at least one trial so that they have been covered by systematic reviews.

Susanne

"I can’t give other women much advice, because there are many things on the market I haven’t tried. But I know, that what works for one woman does not necessarily have the same effect on someone else."

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