Menopause isn’t just a transition—it’s a hormone deficiency with health risks: what the doctor who revolutionised menopause wants you to know

Engaging with her social media followers, Newson discovered widespread gaps in menopause knowledge—among both women and doctors. “I just thought, actually this is an enormous problem that needs fixing, and the more I read about the way our hormones work biologically in our bodies, the more I realised how much the body is suffering without them.”

Newsom identified what she saw as a core misconception—that menopause is merely a “natural transition” to be endured. “Lots of people talk about it as a transition, but menopause lasts forever, until the day we die, because when our hormone levels are low, they stay low and those low hormones have all these effects in our body. So, thinking of menopause as a hormone deficiency with health risks (for example, increased risk of heart disease, osteoporosis, dementia) and thinking about the risks of not having treatment, makes people think quite differently.”

Her pathology background came into play, as she started looking at the role of hormones to prevent disease, which had rarely been addressed. 

“It’s like anything, once you see it, you can’t unsee it. Once you know it, you can’t unlearn it,” she explains. “So, the more knowledge I’ve had, the more information I want to share. It’s become quite addictive.”

In 2019, Newson launched her podcast, The Dr Louise Newson Podcast, which has had more than 8 million downloads to date, and published Menopause: All you need to know in one concise manual. She would go on to become a bestselling author, following up with Preparing for the Perimenopause and Menopause in 2021, and The Definitive Guide to the Perimenopause & Menopause in 2023.

Alongside, she developed the award-winning Balance app, a source of knowledge and community, and a place where women can track their symptoms, which launched in 2020. She has since been credited by the media with kickstarting a menopause revolution in the UK, effectively challenging decades of medical gaslighting and dismissal of women’s symptoms.

While Newson has brought conversations about menopause out in the open, taking advantage of the power and reach of social media that her predecessors were not able to leverage, she too has faced challenges. Her private clinic, which opened in 2018 and has treated around 45,000 women, has received criticism around cost and access, though she says that profits are used to fund research and education as well as being invested back into her app and podcast, both of which are free resources. 

There have also been concerns around the high doses of oestrogen she has at times prescribed—often above the licensed dosage in medical guidelines designed to ensure patient safety—which resulted in a BBC Panorama investigation and the revocation of her British Menopause Society accreditation. Newson has defended her prescribing as highly individualised and rooted in clinical experience, while her supporters argued the investigation was biased and employed scaremongering tactics about HRT.

“It just makes you want to work even harder,” says Newson of the challenges she has faced. “When you’re ahead of the curve, there’s always going to be pushback.”

In the decade since Newson shifted focus to menopause, does she believe the experience of women is improving? “It’s got better and worse,” she says. “A lot of my work has been really empowering for women, but medicine hasn't quite caught up because there's a lot of resistance to change. So, what is happening—and I do feel a bit guilty for it—is women are more empowered with information. They want hormones which perhaps they wouldn't have asked for before. But, there's more refusal by healthcare practitioners. So, women have got the knowledge but the healthcare professionals haven't. There's a real imbalance.”

Newson has tried to address this through the development of online education programmes, which more than 33,000 healthcare professionals globally have downloaded.

She believes menopause education should be for all doctors, where traditionally it is an area that gynaecologists have owned. “[Menopause] is a hormone deficiency with long-term health risks. It affects every organ in our body,” she says. Yet, “medicine has become very siloed: if you have palpitations, you see a cardiologist; if you have muscle and joint pains, you see a rheumatologist; if you have urinary symptoms, you see a urologist. Whereas, actually, these symptoms could all be related to changing hormones, so you’re better off seeing someone who understands hormones in general.” This could—and arguably should—be your general practitioner, or GP.

With conversation around menopause growing and a global menopause care market that was valued at approximately US$17 billion in 2024, and is projected to reach US$24 billion by 2030, Newson is keen to share that she refuses any paid work with pharmaceutical companies nor does she endorse any products. In fact, she believes that many products marketed to support women going through menopause—sometimes termed “menowashing”, such as creams and clothing said to address hot flashes and night sweats, are “really patronising for women.”

“I think we should be looking really holistically. Yes, I don’t have my hormones, so let’s think if I need hormones or want hormones, but let’s also think about how I can reduce my future risk of osteoporosis, heart disease, dementia. So, it’s looking beyond hormones and thinking about lifestyle as well.” For Newson herself, that looks like regular supplements—though not menopause supplements, eating healthily, meditation and exercise in the form of yoga, all of which support future health.

Newson’s advice to pre-menopausal women is to start monitoring symptoms and analysing future health risks. “A lot of people wait until [their symptoms] are really bad to go and see a doctor. A lot of women are told, get your exercise and nutrition right and then let’s talk about hormones, but actually that’s really difficult to do,” says Newson, who personally suffered from such bad muscle and joint pains, along with fatigue and reduced stamina that she struggled to exercise. “Balancing hormones in conjunction [with lifestyle changes] can make a real difference. But, it’s all about choice. My role is not about pushing [a certain treatment], it’s about enabling people to have the knowledge that’s right for them so they can make the decisions that are right for them at the time that’s right for them. We all choose the way we live our lives, and we should choose how we manage our perimenopause and menopause.”

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