Allergies and women's hormones

[ArabeIIaScott]

Just been reading a bit about this and it turns out there seem to be quite a lot of links between allergies, asthma, and hormones.

'Among women with asthma, up to 30–40% in some series have reported worsening of asthma symptoms at specific times of the menstrual cycle. The perimenstrual phase, shortly before and during the first few days of the menstrual period, has been identified as a time during which symptoms may commonly worsen. This may be attributable to a variety of factors including fluctuations in lung mechanics over the menstrual cycle and increasing inflammation during the perimenstrual period.'

'Women taking hormone replacement therapy had significantly greater rates of physician-diagnosed asthma compared with matched controls'

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3537328/

And another article:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3658477/

'This gender dimorphism in the immune function of females could be due to sex hormones. In addition to their effects on sexual differentiation and reproduction, sex hormones influence the immune system. This theory is supported by observations that the female immune response changes throughout the menstrual cycle.'

I find this interesting, as someone who is approaching peri menopause and suffers from allergies and eczema (eczema and asthma being linked) I've noticed it being inexplicably the worse it has been in years after being non existent for ages and then blowing up recently despite no changes to lifestyle or diet.
Thought it must be due to hormones so will have a look into this, thanks

Yup, I have an anaphylactic condition of which female hormones are one of several co-factors (need to be combined with my actual allergen to trigger anaphylaxis), and some women are allergic to female hormones alone.

My allergies became far worse during peri menopause.

Same with epilepsy in women. Although it has a name, catamenial epilepsy and has been known about for centuries, there doesn’t appear to be a great deal of research done on it. Unsurprisingly.

Actually.... I've never thought about this, but that intermittent eczema that arrived at puberty and was off and on annoying all my adult life... I can't remember when it bothered me last. I am about 7 years post-menopause.

Completely.

Looking back over time I did have mild asthma from a young age but I don't wheeze and it's mainly smoke, some chemicals and viruses that cause symptoms which are coughing and a tight chest. Never needed hospital etc.

Severely deteriorated when I hit perimenopause and seemed to worsen considerably after a particularly nasty virus. Reacted much more to certain chemicals etc. However it was i diagnosed for a few years during which I battled a level of chronic fatigue on top of the fatigue of low hormones, children and hypothyroidism.

I also developed gut issues for the first time ever which I now know was a combination of FODMAPs issues and histamine.

Gut really settled with hrt, particularly the progesterone element.

I think asthma has been better too. Not as reactive to cold / humidity also household chemicals and I've been able to drop my combo inhaler a bit.

I've developed some reactions to chlorine however; my skin sometimes isn't great if I go to a pool with chlorine. Luckily there's one that uses a fancy filtration/ uv thing near me. And the sea.

I also started testosterone a few months ago and wondering if that's been particularly impactful. (I had v low levels; all done through Gp.)

It's led to me dropping my level of thyroxine to a lowest level for the first time in decades.

Ironically the only info I could find on that was in a couple of research pieces on trans medicine which said it can improve t4/t3 ratios. There are so many women who still don't feel well on thyroxine it makes me wonder if they re looking at the whole picture.

BUT THERE's NO RESEARCH.

Abso bloody lutely!

I thought it was really interesting that there seem to be quite well known connections but I'd never heard about them before!

Infact, I'm considering dropping the higher level of oestrogen and staying on the rest.

Need to add that the usual testosterone dose was slightly too high for me (after barely any in bloods) so I'm now on half, but that may also have been a thyroxine thing.

Gp must monitor testosterone. I'm a bit worried about women getting it from super drug etc.

But again, NO RESEARCH.

There was a local bbc report about the link between menstrual cycle and asthma symptoms - it featured a friend which is how I came to it .

I'd noticed asthma was worse during menstrual periods but asthma nurse had never heard of it.

See, is this not the kind of thing that it might be really useful to know?!

Wow yes this is interesting! Otoh, is there anything left that isn't linked to hormones?!

True!

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6119719/

'Sex steroid levels change rapidly for women when they are menopausal while in males the change is gradual. While aging is associated with changes in immune cells in both sexes (53), in women heightened immune response and accumulation of antibodies over a period can cause a low grade inflammation which can predispose to sex-bias in inflammatory diseases.'

Article that gives a good simple overview:

https://www.pollie.co/blog/how-hormones-and-gut-impact-your-immune-system

' estrogen, our master female sex hormone, has actions that extend far beyond reproduction. Estrogen acts on every single cellular component of the immune system. In fact, females have higher activation of both their innate and adaptive immune systems compared to males, likely to protect them from infection during pregnancy, delivery, and postpartum. While estrogen equips the female body with potent anti-inflammatory effects, this enhanced immune protection comes at a cost. Research confirms that women are significantly more prone to developing an autoimmune disease compared to men'

https://academic.oup.com/humupd/article/11/4/411/874969

'a sexual dimorphism in the immune response in humans is obvious; females produce more vigorous cellular and more vigorous humoral immune reactions, they are more resistant to certain infections, such as bacterial infections, and suffer a higher incidence of autoimmune diseases as compared with males'

https://www.nature.com/articles/nri.2016.90

'Despite a growing body of literature illustrating sex-based differences in immune responses, immunology ranks the lowest of ten biological disciplines for reporting the sex of animal or human subjects in published papers, with fewer than 10% of articles analysing data by sex1. The field of sex-based biology is undergoing a revolution, in which research funding agencies and journals have launched policies to promote greater consideration, reporting and analyses of sex and gender in the biomedical sciences in an effort to improve rigour and reproducibility (Box 1).It is increasingly important to acknowledge sex differences in immune responses when we consider the marked differences seen between males in females in various diseases'

My GP won't offer testosterone.

I seem to do better off hrt, I've had better concentration and stamina without it.

I wish I'd been able to try testosterone though. I'm someone who doesn't feel appreciably better with thyroxine, though bloods say I'm at the correct level.

So I endure, and wish I was as energetic as I used to be. 54 is no age to reconcile with old age!