• Question: How can hormones affect our health badly?

    Asked by ExtraCheekyNandos to Amy, Craig, Laura, Partha, Saffron on 13 Jun 2015.
    • Photo: Partha Kar

      Partha Kar answered on 13 Jun 2015:

      Either in excess or in shortage, hormonal imbalance could affect health pretty badly.
      Many examples here- but to keep it simple- one example would be the thyroid hormone
      Too much and you may have palpitations, weight loss, sweating, tremor; Too little and you could have tiredness, weight gain, slow heart rate…in short, the balance is pretty important to well being

    • Photo: Saffron Whitehead

      Saffron Whitehead answered on 13 Jun 2015:

      Another example is loss of insulin secretion from the pancreas. The cells in your body cannot take up sugar and you can literally die if not treated with insulin injections. Another example is loss of the stress hormone cortisol and this can cause death. You may not know that sex hormones can promote the growth of cancers such as breast cancer and prostate cancer

    • Photo: Laura Wales

      Laura Wales answered on 18 Jun 2015:

      Another example is hormone replacement therapy (HRT) for women who are going through the menopause. Women going through the menopause might experience night sweats, hot flushes, stress incontinence, bone thinning. HRT is designed to relieve symptoms but research has shown that it could increase the risk of developing breast and ovarian cancer.

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