Research shows that during the menopause, the diversity of the gut microbiome declines and could be contributing to gut issues, menopause symptoms and related long-term disease risk.
Have you noticed your gut health is worse during menopause?
As women go through the menopausal transition, their body experiences a lot of changes. It’s usually only the hormonal changes that we think about, but gut health is no exception either!
Your gut microbiome, made up of trillions of microorganisms, has a vital role in keeping you healthy. Age, diet, environment, lifestyle, stress, medications and even your hormones will influence your gut microbes.
What happens to the gut microbiome during menopause?
Research shows that the gut microbiome is different between men and pre-menopausal women, mostly due to sex hormones like oestrogen and progesterone. But as women approach menopause and hormone levels fluctuate and decline, this seems to significantly alter their gut health. In fact, the female gut microbiome starts to look much more similar to that of the male microbiome during menopause and beyond. The main difference for women is that the diversity of their gut bacteria decreases during this stage of their life.
Little wonder then that menopausal women start to notice digestive issues or a worsening of previously experienced gut symptoms like reflux, bloating, altered bowel movements, wind or discomfort.
Why does this matter?
If your gut microbiome is less diverse, there’s a chance that healthy bacteria start to get crowded out by less healthy ones and this can lead to long-term, chronic health issues if left unchecked.
There’s already an increased risk of conditions like heart disease and diabetes with the onset of menopause and now it seems that changes in gut health may be contributing to this.
One of the roles of your healthy gut bacteria is to help break down hormones like oestrogen, so when there’s a change in hormones and the microbiome during menopause, it’s likely that the body's systems are thrown off-balance. We don’t fully understand exactly how this all happens yet and there’s clearly a need for continuing research in this area. Studies are currently looking at whether hormone replacement therapy (HRT) could play a role in reducing the impact of menopause on gut health.
If we concentrate on optimising gut health, could we lessen the burden of menopause, reduce symptoms and make it a seamless transition for women at this time of their life? And could we reduce the risk of menopause-related diseases?
What can you do?
There are lots of ways to support your gut microbiome. You can modify lifestyle factors like diet and exercise and dig deeper by looking at potential underlying factors contributing to gut issues.
In nutritional therapy, we use a personalised approach to finding the root causes of your issues by taking a detailed health and lifestyle history and assessing your symptoms. By identifying triggers we can then work on gut repair and healing, through bespoke diet and lifestyle changes and supplementation where needed to help rebalance the microbiome and ensure the good guys in your microbiome are being well-nourished.
Keeping your gut healthy during menopause could be a key part of staying healthy and reducing disease risk in the later stages of life.
Take the first step towards improved gut health by booking a free 15-minute 'discovery call' with Mel at Foreshore Nutrition either by using the contact form on the website, or emailing foreshorenutrition@outlook.com
Reference:
Peters, B. A., Santoro, N., Kaplan, R. C., & Qi, Q. (2022). Spotlight on the Gut Microbiome in Menopause: Current Insights. International journal of women's health, 14, 1059–1072. https://doi.org/10.2147/IJWH.S340491