Increasing HRT

[dumdumduuuummmmm]

I'm struggling to find info and my GP (who is great) is also not sure and getting conflicting advice. I am on Evorel Conti. If I need a higher dose I need to supplement the Evorel Conti with an additional Evorel 25 or 50 patch. Do I need to also increase my progesterone?

The best way to do it, would be to swap the Conti for a separate Oestrogen patch and separate progesterone, such as utrogestan. Evorel patches come in 25/50/75/100 doses.

Forgot to say, other wise the Oestrogen may not be sufficient opposed by the progesterone and you could experience some bleeding.

Good luck.

Thank you for your reply. Would you mind elaborating as I'm not quite understanding. If I am on conti which is 50mg of oestrogen and also contains progesterone, why wouldn't I just add an extra 25 or 50 patch of just oestrogen? Why change completely to an oestrogen only patch and add progesterone separately? I am better not taking progesterone in tablet form due to digestive issues and don't want a coil fitted. But I'm not understanding why it would be better than way rather than just adding more oestrogen via patch

The GP first thought I would be ok with the amount of progesterone in the conti patch up to 100 mg of oestrogen (so I could add an extra 50 Evorel patch) but then she said she wasn't sure and wanted to check. I've asked so many forums and no one seems clear on whether the progesterone in a conti patch is sufficient for 100 mg oestrogen or not 😕

The conti only comes in a 50 strength? If you wanted to increase to say 75, you would have to cut the patch in half? Cutting patches is always a bit hit and miss, but might work. Obviously if you wanted to instead from 50 to 100, stick on 2 patches I guess. I

If progesterone is your issue, you are better off sticking to conti and play around with your patches

The bottom line of it is, you need sufficient progesterone to oppose the oestrogen. So your 50 conti is designed to give enough progesterone to the level of oestrogen. If you then stuck on an extra 25 oestrogen only, there MAY not be enough progesterone in that patch to oppose the additional oestrogen.

If you don't want a coil or tablet utrogestan, then your only options would be to use 2 conti patches or cut one in half. Otherwise adding additional oestrogen to your conti, could cause you issues. Not saying it will, but it might.

@Runaround50 if you are on a certain dose of oestrogen gel and then go up, usually you don't increase the progesterone. If it is in the coil, it is still just the coil. If it is tablet, it is usually kept at the same dose even when the oestrogen gel in increased. So the GP is pretty sure I should continue with the Conti and then add a 25 or 50 Evorel(oestrogen only) patch. Sounds right but then she wanted to check. It seems kind of simple if you look at how it is all done with gel but for some reason, with patches, it seems to confuse everyone.

I suggest you do what you think is right for you.
Usually If you want to increase from 50 Conti, you would either use separate patch and tablet etc, or use two Conti patches.