The Blog

a flat lay of women's health items.
A flat lay of general health items.
Weight Gain: Thyroid Problem, Hormonal Shift, or Both?
WOMEN'S HEALTH Jennifer Kostacos, MD, MSCP WOMEN'S HEALTH Jennifer Kostacos, MD, MSCP

Weight Gain: Thyroid Problem, Hormonal Shift, or Both?

Gaining weight over a year without changing how you eat or move, and being told to eat less and move more anyway, is a familiar loop. At least two hormonal systems regulate metabolic rate, and their symptoms overlap almost perfectly — which is why symptoms alone can't answer the question and a single lab value usually doesn't either. Here's how the diagnostic thinking actually works before anyone talks about treatment.

Read More
Hair Thinning in Midlife: Thyroid, Hormones, or Both?
WOMEN'S HEALTH Jennifer Kostacos, MD, MSCP WOMEN'S HEALTH Jennifer Kostacos, MD, MSCP

Hair Thinning in Midlife: Thyroid, Hormones, or Both?

More hair in the drain, on the pillow, in the brush — and the usual response is a shrug, a multivitamin, and a suggestion that it's just aging. At least two separate systems can drive hair thinning in midlife, and they call for different next steps. This one stays diagnostic: what's actually causing it, how the patterns differ, and what a real evaluation includes before anyone starts buying supplements.

Read More
How Long Can You Stay on Hormone Therapy? What Current Guidance Actually Says
WOMEN'S HEALTH Jennifer Kostacos, MD, MSCP WOMEN'S HEALTH Jennifer Kostacos, MD, MSCP

How Long Can You Stay on Hormone Therapy? What Current Guidance Actually Says

A patient six years into hormone therapy recently asked whether she was supposed to have stopped by now. No new symptoms, normal labs — she'd just absorbed the idea that five years was the ceiling. That number has been repeated for two decades without ever having been a rule, and the guidance it came from has since changed considerably. Here's what current evidence actually says about duration.

Read More
Progesterone's Role: Why It's Not Just "The Other Hormone"
WOMEN'S HEALTH Jennifer Kostacos, MD, MSCP WOMEN'S HEALTH Jennifer Kostacos, MD, MSCP

Progesterone's Role: Why It's Not Just "The Other Hormone"

Most women arrive at their menopause appointment knowing plenty about estrogen and almost nothing about progesterone beyond one line: it protects your uterus. True, but it leaves out the part where progesterone acts on the same brain receptors as anti-anxiety medications and measurably changes how you sleep. Here's the fuller explanation, from a physician trained in both internal medicine and menopause care.

Read More