| A small
pilot study conducted by researchers at
the esteemed Mayo Clinic shows that postmenopausal women who used
dietary flaxseed daily reported a 50% reduction in hot flashes over the
course of six weeks. The women were not taking estrogen. Published in the Journal of the Society for Integrative Oncology, the study enrolled 29 postmenopausal women, median age 55, in the study. To join the study, women had to have at least 14 hot flashes a week for at least one month. Over the course of the study, the women sprinkled 40 grams of crushed flaxseed daily into yogurt or cereal or mixed it with orange juice or water. Twenty-one of the women completed the study. Of those 21, the frequency of hot flashes declined 50% and the hot flash score—a combined measure of a flash’s severity and frequency—was found to have decreased about 57%. “Flaxseed worked very well,” said Dr. Sandhya Pruthi, director of the Mayo Breast Clinic at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN. “The women who used it said it really helped them. By the second or third week, most women noticed improvement.” Hormone replacement therapy, particularly estrogen, had been a longtime favorite weapon against hot flashes. However, long-term hormone replacement therapy has fallen out of favor since a large study known as the Women’s Health Initiative found an increased risk of heart disease, breast cancer and other problems. Journal of the Society for Integrative Oncology 6(3): 2007 Go to swansonvitamins.com Click here to return back to the front page |