Study clouds evidence on soy and menopause

Middle-aged women may find some relief from hot flashes and other menopause problems with soy supplements, according to Chinese researchers.

They found daily supplements of soy germ isoflavones reduced the sudden sweats more than inactive placebo pills after six months.

But a U.S. expert wasn't convinced by the results, which run counter to other published studies.

"The majority of them are showing no benefit," said William W. Wong, a nutrition researcher at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston who wasn't involved in the new work.

The new study, published in the journal Menopause, is based on 90 Chinese women. A third of them received placebo pills made of starch, while the rest took soy germ isoflavones, either 84 or 126 milligrams a day.

They all kept diaries of their hot flashes and filled out questionnaires about various problems tied to menopause, including hot flashes, sweating, insomnia, tiredness and headache.

At six months, their Kupperman scores - a measure of symptom severity that ranges from 0 to 63 - had dropped by more than 40 percent from an initial value of about 25 in the soy groups.

Conclusions: A daily supplement of 84 or 126 mg soy germ isoflavones may improve menopausal symptoms, although neither dose was found to affect lipid profiles in early postmenopausal Chinese women after 24 weeks of treatment. The favorable effects are unlikely to be associated with female hormones. ### The North American Menopause Society

The number of hot flashes also fell from about 20 a week to less than 10.

While the same pattern was seen in the placebo group, it was less pronounced. Their symptom score dropped by 29 percent and the number of hot flashes by 35 percent, according to Dr. Yan-bin Ye of Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou.

When symptoms appear in menopause, many women look to the natural world for help. Of the many options available to women in perimenopause and menopause, we classify soy as a menopause “superfood.” Not only have we proven soy effective for reducing frequency and severity of hot flashes in thousands of cases at our clinic, but we have also seen that it is safe and easy to use for nearly everyone, especially as part of a combined approach using healthy lifestyle choices and gentle endocrine support.

So let’s review why soy is an especially healthy choice in menopause and touch on a few points you may not have heard about yet.

Soy isoflavones for menopause symptoms

The soybean (Glycine max) belongs to the legume family, whose members include peas, beans, and peanuts, as well as clovers and alders. Legumes feature phytonutrients that lend some unique benefits to women in menopause. The soybean in especially rich in isoflavones, the most widely studied class of phytonutrients. Of the three main types of soybean isoflavones, the ones found most effective for menopause symptoms relief are genistein and daidzein. Recently a third isoflavone, glycitein, is also being studied to determine its health benefits.