Soy Milk & Menopause
Drinking soy milk can play a role in reducing menopause symptoms, such as hot flashes and night sweats, and may also help to protect your heart and bones from some of the challenges associated with aging. As with any food, balance is key. Getting the right amount of soy in your diet during menopause may help your body adjust to its changing state more comfortably.
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The Facts
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For women who suffer from hot flashes and mood swings or who are worried about post-menopause bone and heart health, adding soy milk to their diets can help to alleviate some of the symptoms and concerns of menopause.
Menopause, typically defined as the end of fertility and diagnosed when a woman has gone 12 months without a period, brings with it numerous physical and emotional symptoms. The hormonal changes brought about by menopause can cause irregular body temperature---hot flashes, cold flashes and night sweats---sleep issues, mood swings, an increase of fat in the abdominal region and thinning hair.
Benefits
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Soy milk may help reduce hot flashes and night sweats, two of the most uncomfortable manifestations of menopausal symptoms. Research suggests that as many as 80 percent of American women in menopause experience hot flashes and night sweats, which can lead to depression and fatigue. It has been theorized that the phytoestrogens in soy's isoflavones act like estrogen, helping to keep the body's estrogen balance more stable as its natural estrogen production decreases, and a Kronenberg review of 12 separate menopause studies found a correlation between high soy intake and reduced frequency of hot flashes.
Soy can also help to prevent the risk of bone fractures after menopause, a concern for many women, according to a 2005 study conducted at Nashville's Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center and published in the journal "Archives of Internal Medicine."
According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), including 25 grams of soy in a healthy daily diet can help reduce risk of cardiovascular disease in all people, including post-menopausal women.
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Recommendations
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Research, like the study at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center, suggests that you don't need to consume a lot of soy to get its positive effects. (The highest amount of soy consumed by participants in that study was just 13 grams; the average was 8 grams.) The FDA recommend getting about 25 grams of soy in your diet each day. A cup of soy milk has about 6.6 grams of soy.
Considerations
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Though the studies here suggest that soy may help with menopause symptoms and concerns, there are also a number of studies that suggest that soy does not improve menopause.
In a study of the effectiveness of soy in treating menopausal hot flashes conducted at the Bowman Gray School of Medicine in North Carolina, researchers found that there was a strong placebo effect: Thirty-five percent of the women taking the placebo reported relief in hot flash intensity, in addition to 50 percent of the women taking soy supplements.
And because soy phytoestrogens stimulate the growth of breast cells in much the way that estrogen does, there's debate over whether soy consumption may play a role in the development of breast cancer. A 2004 study at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign showed that highly processed soy foods and supplements caused breast tumors in animal studies. Because of this, food sources of soy are preferred over supplements.
Soy can play an important role in a balanced diet, but much of the research into soy milk's effectiveness in controlling menopause symptoms is anecdotal rather than clinical. And more than FDA-recommended 25 grams a day of soy can be too much of a good thing and may cause health problems down the road.
Also, check the sugar content of your soy milk. Many come with added sugar, which can have a negative impact on your overall diet. According to nutrition labels for soy milk, you may find anywhere from 10 grams---2 teaspoons---to 0 grams of sugar, so choose a brand whose sugar content best fits into your overall healthy diet.
In general, you should keep your consumption of soy proteins to 25 grams per day or less and get your soy from food sources, such as soy milk, for optimum results.
Menu Ideas
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If you want to add more soy milk to your diet, consider substituting soy milk for regular milk in cereal, oatmeal and smoothies. You can also substitute soy milk for regular milk in soup recipes, mashed potatoes and most other recipes where you would ordinarily use milk.
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References
Resources
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