S1 #E20 Isaac Manyonda, Menopause and HRT - medicalising a natural transition or addressing a vast unmet need in women’s health!?

Isaac has recently retired from being a consultant Obstetrician and Gynaecologists at St George's University Hospital in London. Where he specialised in
• Recurrent miscarriage
• Fibroid disease
• Menopause
• Minimal access surgery
• High risk obstetrics

He was instrumental in establishing the first and still one of the few cutting-edge dedicated centres for research and treatment of fibroid disease and was lead author in a recent major national trial on myomectomy versus uterine artery embolization published in the New England Journal of Medicine. He has published more than 250 publications in peer review journals including Nature, the BMJ, the Lancet, NEJM, BJOG, Circulation and Hypertension. He has published 4 books and numerous chapters, letters and reviews. In this episode we discussed many controversial topics relating to menopause – several of which are in opposition to the last podcast episode with Prof Susan Davis. Isaac and I had previously debated the motion: This house believes that menopause is a hormone deficiency disorder. Hear what Isaac really thinks about this question. Doctors vary in their definition of menopause symptoms and how to treat them. Isaac gives his option and explains why he does not think all women need HRT and that the extremes some doctors practice such as the extreme of giving every women HRT and the other extreme of giving no women HRT, are not correct. Does he think HRT is a drug? What about giving testosterone? What about high doses of HRT? He answers all these questions. He also explains why he does not think that doing a menopause test is beneficial to perimenopausal women.

For more information and to access the transcript: https://joyceharper.com/podcasts/

Date of episode recording: 2023-09-19
Duration: 1.25.31
Language of episode: English
Presenter:Joyce Harper
Guests: Prof Isaac Manyonda
Producer: Joyce Harper