Functional Medicine | Women's Health
By Dr. Shawna Darou, ND Your thyroid gland is central to your metabolism, and it impacts almost every system in the body. It can cause menstrual cycle changes and infertility, it can increase cardiovascular risk factors, cause depression and cognitive issues, impact gut motility, and lead to swelling in the body. Thyroid issues are extremely …
Continue Reading about Is Your Thyroid Underactive? Factors to consider →
By Dr. Shawna Darou, ND Progesterone is a key hormone for women’s health, produced by the corpus luteum, only after ovulation. It has a tremendous influence on your mood (think PMS), sleep, period flow, fertility, and more. It is also important as the hormone that balances out our estrogen levels, keeping us out of an estrogen dominant state. What …
Continue Reading about Hormone imbalance spotlight: Luteal Phase Defect →
By Dr. Shawna Darou, ND Your muscle is your largest endocrine organ, and many researchers suggest that we should be measuring muscle mass, rather than fat mass or BMI (body mass index) as a marker of health. The reason for this is that having more muscle mass is associated reduced disease risk, less chance of diabetes, better bone density, and …
By Dr. Shawna Darou, ND Testing for blood sugar imbalance and specifically insulin resistance is a very frequent test I request. The reason is that we are experiencing a growing number of cases of blood sugar imbalance, and diabetes at much younger ages. It is extremely important to detect insulin resistance early, because this is the phase of …
Continue Reading about 6 Surprising signs that point to insulin resistance →
By Dr. Shawna Darou, ND What is Hashimoto's Thyroiditis? Hashimoto’s is a very common autoimmune condition that causes hypothyroidism or under-active thyroid. Your immune system attacks the thyroid gland causing inflammation called chronic lymphocytic thyroiditis, which then leads to under-production of thyroid hormones and a slower metabolism. …
By Dr. Shawna Darou, ND Hair thinning is actually a very common issue that I see in the clinic, and it can be extremely distressing. In this article, I will review some of the causes of hair thinning that I test for, and some solutions to get your hair growing again. One important thing to note is that getting the hair into a re-growth cycle can …
Continue Reading about Getting to the root of female hair loss →
By Dr. Shawna Darou, ND What is endometriosis? With endometriosis, there is abnormal growth of uterine lining cells, in places outside of the uterus. These cells outside of the uterus are called ‘endometrial implants’ and they can attach themselves to the fallopian tubes, ovaries, intestines, bladder, outside of the uterus, and sometimes travel …
Continue Reading about 5 things you may not know about Endometriosis →
By Dr. Shawna Darou, ND We live in a culture that embraces extremes - extreme work hours, extreme ambition, and high performance in all areas of life. When this translates to nutrition and exercise, it can actually become… well… unhealthy. Extremes with diets, exercise, fasting, cleanses, detoxes can turn out to be not so healthy on several …
Continue Reading about How to practice the Art of Moderation →
By Dr. Shawna Darou, ND Endometriosis is a hormonal condition that appears to be growing in frequency at an alarming rate. I have some theories as to why, and we'll get to those below. The good news is though that you can balance your hormones, reduce pain and improve fertility with endometriosis, and a lot of this has to do with diet and …
