Ladies with UC

I have had some advice from a leading consultant in hormone and blood testing. I mentioned to him that I strongly felt my UC was very closely linked to my hormone levels. I have had my flare ups after big dips in my hormone levels such as after miscarriage, after birth and I get mild symptoms before periods and before ovulation. I had 7 remission years where I had no symptoms and was medication free and this was when I was on the contraceptive pill and there was always an increased level of oestrogen in my blood. This was his reply:

The situations where you get an exacerbation of your ulcerative colitis are when there are big falls in oestrogen, not progesterone. Salivary tests are a waste of time and money, there is absolutely no point in measuring progesterone levels and no real point in measuring oestrogen levels. As an immediate measure, you could start using a top-up dose of oestrogen during the week prior to your period, and then discontinue it about 3 days into your period as your own oestrogen levels would be rising then. Ask your GP to give you some oestradiol 50 mcg patches which you change every 3 and a half days. I hope this may help.

I shall be investigating this further.

Let me know your thoughts.

Wow! Which Chinese meds are you on? I have tried acupuncture which actually made me worse! I would love to get off meds.

Yes UC symptoms can get worse before periods as that is when oestrogen dips dramatically and mid-cycle during ovulation.

Repeat of my reply from your other thread about oestrogen because I think it is important to note that a lot of research also points to oestrogen being implicated in flaring

Any chance of finding out what research is his basis for this? I've scoured for research on hormones and UC and am surprised how little there is, especially as onset often seems to be at times of hormonal change. I've found really conflicting information about oestrogen, I seem to remember finding one study that recommended oestrogen as protective but have found more that say it is implicated in flares - such as the report here www.medpagetoday.com/MeetingCoverage/DDW/32794 - probably dependent on the person's age and I suppose gender.

Would be great if you could update how you get on if you go ahead with this.

I spoke to my GI nurse on this and she stated that oestrogen does cause any UC symptoms but does increase UC patients risk of DVT.

I am not really interested in taking estrogen because of the risk of DVT. It's already something we are more at risk for having UC and i've seen a few people here have issues in the past. It really scares me. I used to take BCP with estrogen and that's when my UC began. A few years later I switched to a mini pill and things were calm at the time. Now things are not good and I am still on the same minipill. I am not sure whether hormones have played a role. In the past I definitely felt like that did but now I think risking DVT is not something I want to play with.