Handling painful intercourse during Menopause

Dr. Steven R. Goldstein MD Handling painful intercourse during menopause

Dr Steven R. Goldstein MD is a well-known Menopause specialist in NYC and Osteoporsis specialist who has helped thousands of women over his 30 plus years of private practice to combat the symptoms of menopause. One of the situations menopausal women encounters is painful sex during menopause. This does not have to be. Today, women are spending 40% or more of their lives in a menopausal state. They are familiar with the hot flashes night sweats and so on. However, roughly 80% of menopausal women will see those symptoms go away in four to five years, though it may last indefinitely for some women. The lack of estrogen in the vagina causes atrophy changes, meaning a wasting away or diminution of tissue, that gets worse and worse over time. This can make attempts at sexual intimacy extremely painful. Sadly, studies have shown that over fifty percent of menopausal women think this is the way it has to be. Only seven percent of healthcare providers even initiate a conversation about sexual intercourse after menopause. As a hormone specialist in NYC, Dr Goldstein says there are a number of very safe products. There are estrogen creams, tablets, rings that go into the vagina with very low doses of estrogen. These low dose vaginal estrogens, when used appropriately do not cause any adverse effects and are not absorbed into the blood stream. In fact many women under treatment for breast cancer are allowed to use these low dose vaginal estrogens by their oncologists.