Each year more than one million American women begin menopause — an experience many don’t understand and few talk about. Often referred to as “the change,” the most common symptoms include — hot flashes, brain fog and fatigue.

“I had insomnia for years,” Dr. Tina Opie, a management professor at Babson College, told Under the Radar. “I was sweating profusely. I would be at work and forget my train of thought.” 

What’s more, many are still in the dark about how to navigate this natural transition in life, even with new information and medication available. 

For some people like Marian Themeles, a breast cancer survivor who has experienced hot flashes, the standard hormone replacement therapy treatment is not viable, despite her severe symptoms. 

She says it feels like, “suffocation from the inside. You get incredibly hot, and you feel like you can't breathe, and that lasts several minutes.”

However, there is a newly approved drug, Fezolinetant, designed to treat hot flashes for patients who cannot take the standard hormone replacement therapy. 

Dr. Jan Shifren, a reproductive endocrinologist and obstetrician/gynecologist said, for the first time, “we are really targeting a place in the brain where hot flashes occur and in very well controlled trials, it reduces the severity and frequency of hot flashes.”

This conversation and more this week on Under the Radar with Callie Crossley. 

GUESTS 

Dr. Jan Shifren, a reproductive endocrinologist and obstetrician/gynecologist and director of the Massachusetts General Hospital Midlife Women's Health Center

Marian Themeles, a patient of Massachusetts General Hospital who uses the prescription menopause medicine, Veozah (Fezolinetant)

Dr. Tina Opie, an associate professor in management at Babson College