Dear S.B.,

Listening to what your body tells you and sharing that information with your health care provider is important. Testing is the next step for understanding why you feel as you do and knowing how to make yourself feel better.

For example, perhaps you started HRT and are happy to experience any degree of symptom improvement. Only by measuring hormone levels can you and your health care provider be sure you are experiencing the best results possible. Instead of feeling better, a slight adjustment in your HRT dose could have you feeling great!

Or maybe some symptoms improved with HRT while others continued. In this case, testing is the only way to know if hormone levels are the cause and what dosage adjustments need to be made. For example, if hot flashes persist, they could be caused by hormone levels that are too high or too low. The only way to know is testing.

In another case, PMS symptoms may be strongly influenced by blood sugar levels. A change in hormone dose, without testing, could make symptoms worse when a better solution might be to eat five or six small meals throughout the day instead of three large meals.

How you feel is a good place to start, but testing takes the guesswork out of determining if your HRT regimen is right for you.

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