GynoFiles

At Women's Health Practice we want our patients to know their blood pressure, track it at home and keep their blood pressure normal. For many women aggressive lifestyle changes will keep them off medicine, and that's where we think we can help our patients make those positive changes.It is also true that those with other conditions are more likely to need medicines than just lifestyle changes. Those There have been some disagreements as to what is hypertension and what is pre-hypertension, and when to treat. Some people on treatment need to use more medicine to get their blood pressure lower. Others can avoid blood pressure medicine all together. Women should know that the newest guidelines from the recent  The American College of Cardiology (ACC) and the American Heart Association (AHA) have released a new set of numbers as the guideline on hypertension with a new definition that will call 130 to 139 mm Hg systolic and or 80 to 89 mm Hg stage 1 hypertension. Some women pre...

The fact of the matter is, your weight and your waist size does matter. So measuring your waist and making sure you reduce your abdominal fat will improve your health. Some gynos will quote the left hand washes the right, others will refer to the chicken and the egg problem, and still others will refer to hand in glove. Whatever your metaphor is the message is simple: cardiovascular factors and obesity are linked in exactly that way. The importance of obesity as a heart risk factor was demonstrated in the prospective cohort Nurses' Health Study of over 115,000 middle-aged women.  Body weight and death rates are directly related, so the message is slim that waistline.  Your waistline is the critical factor and those who have the so called apple shape of abdominal obesity (waist-hip ratio of above 0.9) are more likely to suffer from severe medical complications of heart disease. In a recent report in  Managed Healthcare Executive they point out that the increase in risk ...

The benefits of breastfeeding for baby has never been in doubt. The health benefits of breastfeeding for mom were mostly for many years focused on faster post partum weight loss, and then the focus blurred with not only on benefits, but physical negatives for mom from breastfeeding. The saying 'you loose a tooth for each child' meaning the loss of bone calcium in pregnancy exaggerated by calcium loss during breastfeeding. Nutrition, exercise, and avoiding smoking has pretty much eliminated that concern! But interestingly as we have begun to scientifically explore the wide ranging benefits for mom from breastfeeding beyond weight loss: less diabetes, less breast cancer, less hypertension, fewer myocardial infarctions, and now it has been shown to help prevent cardiovascular disease due to less atherosclerosis, in a study on lactation from the CARDIA group.  Breastfeeding to reduce the physical risks of gestational diabetes is becoming more and more important as gestational di...

Major Risk Factors Aging, although most are diagnosed around menopause Personal history of breast cancer Close family history of cancer Genetic mutations known to cause breast cancer  Minor Risk Factors Early age of first menstrual period (before age 12) Late age of menopause after age 55 Hormone therapy with progesterone for greater than 5 years Having no children or having first child after the age of 30 Previous benign breast biopsy (within 3 months) Lack of exercise, meaning under 4 hours a week  Alcohol consumption, over 2 drinks per day Obesity after menopause, especially over 44 pounds of weight gain Hormone imbalance like PCOS Endometrial cancer and colon cancer Ovarian cancer High blood pressure Low Vitamin D levels Diet Low in fruit and vegetables

The first reason to lose weight when pregnancy planning, if you are obese is that  obesity is associated with subfertility, as well as miscarriages. growth disorders for the fetus, birthing problems, diabetes and hypertension, just to name a few of the issues. You can find a lot about risk factors for birth defects on March of Dime s site, but you may have to ask your gyno about your overall fitness to become pregnant as obestity for one issue is not covered there. It is not known exactly why obese patients have trouble conceiving. Women who are obese and have polycystic ovarian disease (PCOS) are less likely to ovulate and conceive. But women who are obese without PCOS are also less likely to ovulate than the average person due to increased insulin resistance (your body not responding to insulin as normal women do), and that treating this will increase fertility.   Miscarriages also called Spontaneous abortions ( SAB) and recurrent SAB are also associa...

Induction of labor is the bringing on of labor prior to the spontaneous onset of natural labor. The reasons for needing an induction may be either based on the health of the mother or the health of the baby, and the optimal time is when both the health of the mother and the health of the baby is considered. Some studies say that being born on time, not very much before or after this "on time" date is the best for babies. But moms may have their own health consideration, and one common medical problem is hypertension in pregnancy. A relatively new study called HYPITAT, which specifically studied hypertension in pregnancy, was quoted as saying that induction of labor "should be advised for women with mild hypertensive disease beyond 37 weeks' gestation." For more information regarding the specifics (warning some is written in Dutch!) you can go to The study of Hypertension and Preeclampsia at Term  . Some of the most interesting information regarding this trial...

Women have been wondering, how do we eat to control hot flashes. Diet, the composition of that diet, your overall nutritional health, and your hormonal state all factor into whether you are going to have moderate or severe hot flashes. For some women this is merely adjusting her diet to be a bit less bothered; for other women eating right to control hot flashes can be a matter of significant health consequences. The Newest data released in October of 2012 from the Women's Health Initiative gives clues as to how diet affects your hot flashes. The diet can affect how you work with a hot flash that is occurring now, as well as the overall numbers of hot flashes you will have in the future. Gyno's have always recommended cooling water, and generally to be well hydrated when you are having hot flashes. Water to your diet is always good, and that is one way we should feed our hot flashes. Other gynos have recommended adding soy to the diet, but high soy intake has not consistently...