Amberen for Menopause Symptoms

Dear Ask The Doctor: I am a 48 year old perimenopausal woman thinking about trying Amberen and wondering if it is safe. Do you think Amberen is safe?

Dear Tonya: I appreciate your trust in medical doctors and this website.

As a medical doctor, I try my best to not provide information based on my opinion or anecdotal evidence.  I rely on quality clinical trails.  The highest standards of clinical trials in medical research are randomized control trials.

These are trials where we subject one group to the treatment and another group to a placebo and compare the outcomes.  In the best trials, the patients and observer do not know which group they or other patients are in.

When researching Amberen, I could only find one trial titled "A succinate-based composition ”rejuvenates” aging mice and alleviates menopausal symptoms in women without sex hormone replacement therapy"  The study seems to suggest that Ambergen helps with hot flashes, anxiety, and headaches when taken twice daily.

I should also point out that the study also has several flaws:

• Only 70 women were studied. We usually like to see studies with several thousand participants.
• The study only followed women for 21 days. We usually like to see longer studies to assess the risk of long term use.
• An uneven number of women were placed into each group. We usually like to see studies that have equal group sizes.

I suggest you see your doctor to discuss options for your symptoms that have been better studied and have longer history of successful use. Thank you again for your trust.