Progesterone:

[Guest guest]

From a book: progesterone - the natural hormone by Kimberley Paterson

Progesterone - What its all about?

 

Some of the most exciting work in terms of real solutions to health

problems comes from biochemists and scientists who are coming to grips

with the healing power of plants. This new movement understands that

nature herself can help without too much of mankind's tinkering.

 

My 1995 trip to England took me on to Europe where I met a young Danish

biochemist deeply involved in this kind of work, a perfect example of an

enlightened new breed of scientific researcher. His passion is the power

he finds in organically grown plant compounds, natural remedies he takes

and enhances with modern technology to create a whole new gender of

natural remedy: a veritable 'super botanical' for the 21st century.

 

The beauty of his work lies not only in marrying the best of ancient

plant wisdom with the best of our modern age, but in that he is a

scientist with a spiritual consciousness, aware of the profound impact

people like him can have on the future health of humankind.

 

Natural progesterone, too, has its genesis in both worlds: the

diosgnenin plant compound from the wild yam (discorea villosa and

dioscorea mexicana) is converted in a three-stage laboratory process to

a molecule that is nature identical. (Disogenin is a plant sterol, a

substance closely related to human steroid hormones).

 

Nature identical or bio-identical means that the molecule is exactly the

same as the progesterone that is made in the human body. Because natural

progesterone is nature identical, the body can use it and tolerate it

exactly as it would our own progesterone.

 

Diosgenin from wild yams is also used by the pharmaceutical industry as

the starting block in the creation of synthetic oestrogen and

progestogens. What then is the difference between synthetic and nature

identical? Slight variations in the structure of the atoms in a

molecule. It sounds simple enough; one set of processing techniques

takes you to a nature identical hormone, the other to a synthetic

hormone. One matches the hormone in our body exactly: the other is

similar but not the same. These slight variations lead to big

differences in the effect these molecules have on our bodies.

 

Every year we learn more and more about hormones and how exquisitely

fined-tuned and sensitive they are. We now know that hormones fit into

receptor sites all over the human body in a process described as a 'key

fitting into a lock'. When this happens it's as though a cell door

swings open and the hormone relays its chemical message into that cell

.... a master plan at the edges of human understanding all going on

without a single thought from us.

When you think about the perfect design of the human eco-system, it's

little wonder that foreign substances wreak such internal damage. Most

modern 'life-saving' drugs come with lists of adverse reactions and

side-effects. Synthetic oestrogens are strongly linked with uterine and

breast cancer; synthetic progestogens with blood clots, changes in

vision, irregular bleeding.

 

If nature identical hormones give such good results with few associated

problems, why not just formulate natural hormones and be done with it?

 

'It is a sad commentary on the pursuit of profit over women's wellbeing

that the pharmaceutical companies take perfectly good natural hormones

that our bodies know and can use them, creating synthetic compounds with

similar hormonal effects but toxic side-effects.' -

 

Dr John Lee.

 

Well, that's the rub. Pharmaceutical companies are businesses that exist

to return a profit and it doesn't make sound commercial sense for them

to work with nature identical hormones. Why not? Because the system

we've created means it costs vast sums of money to put a new drug on the

market, literally millions. To expend that kind of money on development,

research, manufacturing and trialing a new product, pharmaceutical

companies have to know that they 'own' the molecular structure and

technology for a certain length of time so they can get a return and

profit on their investment.

 

That's why patients exist. A new molecule can be 'patented', in effect

owned for a certain number of years so the company can market and sell

it's product without competition. Natural hormones can't be owned.

Therefore it doesn't make financial sense for pharmaceutical companies

to expend the huge resources required to create nature identical

molecules when, at any time, a competitor could do the same thing and

the money would be lost.

 

That's why HRT and the oral contraceptive pill are so very familiar to

us and to the medical profession (you can be sure that pharmaceutical

companies spend a lot of money ensuring doctors know all about their

products). That's why the information about natural progesterone comes

to us from the very small band of doctors who have been prescribing it

and from the women who have been taking it over the past two decades.

Natural hormones aren't allocated big advertising budgets, slick

promotions and glossy advertisement campaigns to inform the medical

profession about them. That's why chances are your doctor knows little

or nothing about natural progesterone.

 

We are beginning to hear about natural progesterone and the other

bio-identical hormones because doctors like Katherina Dalton, Ray Peat

and John Lee spent years in research, trying to understand their

potential and gradually introduce them to their patients. It's good news

for us now, but sobering to think how many women have suffered

needlessly - not to mention died - from decades of adverse reactions to

synthetic copies.

 

" We know that we don't have as many studies on bio-identical hormones as

we have on synthetic hormones. We know that the whole reason for that is

because of patent issues; the pharmaceutical house has to make a

molecule that is not bio-identical.' - Dr Christiane Northrup.

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