If there are any post-menopausal women on HRT on here who are taking Rapa, did you see any changes in estrogen or progesterone levels/side effects when you started Rapa?
I have seen documentation of Rapa causing Testosterone to go down in men, but I can’t find anything about its effects on female hormones.
I am also quite interested in effect on hormones in menopausal women who are not on HRT
Me, @AmyK. That is, yes, I’m on HRT and taking rapa. But I’m only 2 months into rapa, and starting very low dose. I’m also wanting to know more about interactions with testosterone at our lower levels.
Can you link to the studies about men, in case they are even a little relevant? Or do you think they’re not? I see that you’re actually a doctor in this field, so I’d like your take on it.
Yep, I should have mentioned that all the HRT I do is bio-identical.
I shouldn’t assume that’s a given for everyone, though it certainly is for me.
I believe it’s becoming the standard; non-compounding branded HRT offers BI these days, too.
There’s a whole thread on here about testosterone in men with links to studies as well as men’s personal experiences with testosterone. But, I’ve not seen studies on women or even heard from post-menopausal women. In theory, rapa could decrease women’s testosterone a bit, since rapa is inhibiting mTOR, which is the opposite of telling the body to make anabolic hormones. But, given that women’s testosterone is about 1/10th of men’s, I don’t know that the effect would be especially evident in women.
The reason I ask is I know an older woman on estradiol and progesterone who started low dose rapamycin. She began experiences “hormone type” symptoms including frequent tearfulness, cystic breasts, and hair loss as well as hot flashes. I’m not her doctor but recommended that she get her hormone levels checked as those symptoms are most suggestive of abnormal estrogen/progesterone balance. I’m still waiting on those labs but wondered if anyone else had had similar symptoms.
Agree. Most doctors who are familiar with the literature are offering bio or body identical progesterone and estradiol. Some are compounded. Some are pharmaceuticals. Both are essentially the same as long as they are estradiol and progesterone.
Some doctors still prescribe Premarin but is less common than it previously was. And, I’m hoping nobody is still prescribing medroxyprogesterone because that was the really detrimental drug. 
Great topic! You are correct that most of the information I have seen shows some reduction in testosterone for men, but some improvement for women. Also, too make sure we are talking about apples to apples - this is in non- HRT replaced men and women. I will repost the lecture on Rapa helping women to avoid early menopause.
@AmyK these are good questions. I’d be curious about her exact doses, and what else she’s taking for nutritional engineering–pregnenalone/DHEA/vitamin D, folate, b12, etc. That all adds to the equation.
I don’t know enough about the underlying theory–HRT, specifically testosterone in women, and how it interacts with rapamycin–but I do have some preliminary thoughts based on my personal experience if that might be useful.
Feel free to drop me a note if you want to chat more about this. I’m not ready to make my speculations public.
But, given that women’s testosterone is about 1/10th of men’s
My understanding is that it’s more like 1/100th. Variation, yes, but those are the general numbers I’ve seen.
I can speak from experience from the men’s side and the women’s postmenopausal side.
My wife and I take 5mg of rapa every Monday and have been doing so for the past year. She is on bio-identical progesterone and estrogen and testosterone and I am on bio-identical testosterone. Because of this we get regular blood draws to keep an eye on our levels.
Over the past year we have seen no changes to our hormone levels and have required no changes to our hormone doses. The only odd thing is that she is postmenopausal, but not long after we started taking rapa she started getting spotting and, sometimes, what looked like a full period. We got her checked for any type of cysts, tumors, etc. and she has none. She is perfectly healthy. It leads me to wonder if taking the rapa has brought on a mini-period for her. I have read the studies on fertility and how rapa affects it, but it’s hard to establish a strong causal link as we take many other supplements as well.
Hope this helps.
I am interested too. I am a post-menopausal woman who has been slowly increasing my Rapa dose to 5 mg once a week over 3 months. Sometimes I wonder if I am feeling “crampy” after not having a period for 8 years. I tried bio-identical hormones (low dose estradiol patch and progesterone) a few years ago and started cramping and spotting and was advised to stop the hormones and I had to have a whole workup done. I would like to hear about the experiences of other post-menopausal women taking Rapa and whether it has affected their hormone levels or had any negative impacts.
Thanks, it seems to have made me weepy almost like PMS
also very slight spotting. Because I am in clinical trial, i am unsure if i am taking placebo, 5mg or 10mg. but have had a bit of acne and small mouth sore.
Thanks, it seems to have made me weepy almost like PMS
also very slight spotting. Because I am in clinical trial, i am unsure if i am taking placebo, 5mg or 10mg. but have had a bit of acne and small mouth sore. i am very slightly concerned about the need to resume birth control… like that would be very embarrassing if I somehow got pregnant at 65!
That does help. Thank you. Spotting suggests higher estrogen levels or increased activity at estrogen receptor, which is in keeping with what my friend experienced. Interesting that get estrogen levels in blood didn’t change though .
My doctor was very worried about uterine cancer when I started spotting at 63 (pre-Rapa and on HRT) and this led to a workup and procedure. I have been researching Rapa and see no obvious connections to an increase in reproductive system cancers (that I can see), but this is an off label use of the medication and there isn’t a huge amount of research. I do hear these anecdotal reports of cycle changes and delayed menopause, so something is probably going on.
I am on HRT for years now and I think nothing changed since I took Rapa for the first time ~2 months ago. Its a wee bit different in my case, so I am 42 and not post-moenopausal. I’m on the HRT because of my small ovaries caused my intersexuality. I’m taking Testosteron and Estrogene. So if I couldnt feel any differences between pre-rapa treatment and now, its maybe because Im on Testosteron too.
But I am wondering if it is such a difference if your ovaries produce enough E17 or you’re on a HRT. Why should Rapa effect a HRT and not the ovarial production or aromatase?
Studies:
there are some studies on pubmed about rapa and metastatic breat cancer in postmenopausal women or hormone-receptor-positive adv breast cancer. Thats not exactly what we’re looking for especially they put the patients on anti-hormones too. One study indicates that Rapa could affect progesterone levels, but for me its not really clear that it was caused by Rapa. I have no time for diving deeper into the data.
On word for normal levels on T:
normal T levels for females are up to 2.8nmol/l
for males: 8,0-25,2nmol/l.
sure, it depends on in what database you’re looking, but they are only slightly different
Maybe your friend has another problem. If I was her, I would go to an endocrinologist and ask to check SHGB, Testosteron (FTI and Free), Estrogene, progesterone, iron, b12, HB, HR, prolaktine, LH and FSH.
Thank you for sharing. Yes. I’ve recommended all of those tests and more for her.
I am doing just that.
Haven’t noticed any any changes in hormones but I am only taking it 1mg a day for 5 days from day 19 to 23 of my artificial “cycle”.