“My quality of life has been greatly improved.”
After a hysterectomy at age 47 I began with estrogen patches then switched to oral estrogen for the next 17 years, reducing the dose over time. I found that I couldn't go below .5 mg because I developed uncomfortable bladder symptoms - irritation with feeling I had to urinate constantly. Higher oral dose had negative side effects - sore breasts and frequent ocular migraines. I supplemented .5 mg oral dose with Vagifem vaginal tablets for the bladder symptoms. Those tablets became quite expensive over time as my health insurance considered them to be in their most expensive category. I decided to stop oral estrogen at age 65 and considered my options for vaginal cream estrogen. I was lucky to have a female gynecologist (in Arizona at that time) who suggested I try a compounding pharmacy for the cream as it was 1/3 the cost of prescription estrogen, Estrace vaginal cream. She gave me a prescription that I then continued when I moved to South Dakota. Each prescription would last from 3-5 months. As so often happens, Fed regulation came in to attempt to further regulate estrogen and no longer allowed a prescriptive dose to last longer than a month with a substantial price increase. Insurance plans by the way do not cover compounded medications, even when prescribed by my doctor, so all of the vaginal cream has been an out-of-pocket expense. My South Dakota compounding pharmacy said that I could switch from estradiol cream to an estriol cream which is a weak form of estrogen and many women find equal symptom alleviation. I opted to try that - over a year ago now - and have been very pleasantly surprised that I have the same vaginal tissue and bladder symptom relief as I did with estradiol cream.
As I said in my short statement, "my quality of life has been greatly improved" using first vaginal estradiol then estriol cream. Since stopping oral estrogen all of my breast pain and ocular migraines have disappeared. I've been on vaginal cream for the past 6 years with high satisfaction. The cost of the compounded medication is very affordable which is an added bonus.