Up to this point, Ms. Nguyen Thi Kim Anh (54 years old, HCMC) cannot remember how many types of functional foods she has used to retain her youth.
According to Ms. Kim Anh, since she was over 35 years old, she started using many types of vitamins and functional foods to supplement female hormones for her body. For convenience, she hired a person who specializes in dividing the functional foods into meals, and she just uses them.
However, after a long time of use, when she reached pre-menopause, she felt tired and decided to go to the doctor. The doctor advised her to stop using functional foods because long-term abuse could overload the pancreas and affect other organs when she got older.
Ms. Kim Anh's case is not uncommon, as functional foods are now widely sold on many platforms with different prices and brands.
This "matrix" of functional foods makes it easy for users to abuse them without realizing it.
Master, Doctor Tran Ngoc Khanh Nam, Department of Dermatology - Cosmetic Dermatology, University of Medicine and Pharmacy Hospital, Ho Chi Minh City said that during the examination, many patients came to see an endocrinologist for the reason of losing their beauty.
However, it is important to understand that the decline in beauty is partly due to hormones, and partly due to the aging process, lifestyle, etc. Therefore, before supplementing hormones, it is necessary to check whether the body lacks female hormones or not, and if supplementation is needed, one must know how to supplement.
Each age stage will have changes in hormone levels in the body. For example, during puberty, the body becomes softer and more beautiful due to strong hormone activity.
However, from the age of 35-40, female hormone levels begin to decline, and the aging process occurs. During pre-menopause, the decline in female hormones becomes more obvious, and bones are also susceptible to osteoporosis due to hormone deficiency.
According to Dr. Khanh Nam, in reality, many women today supplement female hormones from the outside with products advertised to have many different effects, but mainly aim to increase hormones.
However, it should be used in a controlled manner and under the guidance of a doctor, because the abuse of female hormones can increase the risk of diseases such as endometriosis, ovarian cancer, breast cancer, biliary and pancreatic diseases, and increase the risk of blood clots leading to venous thrombosis.
Therefore, female hormones are not something that can be supplemented arbitrarily. When wanting to fight the aging process, it is important to maintain a healthy lifestyle, exercise to have a healthy body, take care of your skin daily, and use sunscreen to limit aging.
