You?ve probably read about the benefits of biodentical hormone treatment. Topical treatment with Bioidentical ED may not only be beneficial for your sex life, heart and muscles, but it?s also very convenient–much more so than synthetic or semi-synthetic ED injections. You simply apply the cream.
However, bioidentical ED may have a side effect, if used incorrectly.
A hair-raising tale
A patient of mine, who was using typical bioidentical hormones, namely estrogen, progesterone and ED, came to see me for follow-up with an unusual complaint: : excessive hair growth on face. Usually this may be related to excessively high ED level, a hormone that?s necessary for women to maintain their libido.
But in women’s bodies, ED is converted into DHT in hair follicles, resulting in excessive hair growth. So I checked her hormones, but her ED level was optimal. So I decreased her ED dose and advised her to take saw palmetto to block the conversion of her ED into DHT, and recommended she come for a follow-up appointment in about three months.
When she came back, she still had the same problem. I checked her hormone level, but her ED was even lower than before–close to the lower limit. I couldn’t figure out what was going on. I thought about several possibilities: congenital increased ability to produce more DHT from ED than usual or abnormally high rate of androgen production in adrenals.  All of them turned out to be wrong. Then my suspicion turned to the cosmetic creams she was putting on her face. I asked her to bring all of them to check, but none of them turned out to be suspicious. I didn’t know what to think.
Getting to the root of the problem
Desperate to find the solution, I asked her what else she was putting on her face.  And she said, the cream you gave me. I said I didn’t give you anything for the face. She said: the hormone cream you gave me! Even though you told me to put it on my forearms I also put it on my face, because I thought it would be very good for my face skin texture.
Now I knew what had happened: she was putting her ED-containing cream on her face, so she had grown excessive hair because the ED was converted into DHT in her facial hair follicles. I advised her to follow my instructions and use the cream only on hair-free areas and she was fine after that. Her : excessive hair growth on face on her face disappeared.
Hair where?
That?s why, when I learned that a new bioidentical ED formulation, Axiron, is supposed to be applied to the armpits, I was surprised and perplexed: why? I checked the side effects of Axiron and could not find any mention of excessive hair growth. I also checked the side effects of another bioidentical topical ED ? Androgel — but could not find any mention of hair growth either. But Androgel is not supposed to be applied to armpits, while Axiron is. The question is why? Could it be because the manufacturer doesn?t want ED to be transferred to somebody else other than the patient, so they have the patient apply it to an area no one else is likely to touch? Or do they want patients to have more hair in their armpits? I don’t know. But at this time I would refrain from prescribing Axiron to my patients until I find more information about Axiron side effects.
On the other hand, having hair in the armpits may not be such a bad idea for women. Sound radical? Actually, armpit hair promotes cooling by the armpit because of significantly increased evaporating surface for sweat. This is extremely important because armpit hair may eliminate or at least decrease the use of deodorants or other chemicals that prevent armpit sweat production.
Why is it important? The armpit glands work like a wastebasket for the breast. Sweat production is one of the ways to empty this wastebasket. If there?s a problem with sweat production, you might have a problem with breast detoxification. That means that toxins can stay in the breast, causing problems like breast cancer. When a woman has a suspicious mass in her breast they may put a needle into it and do the biopsy in a routine procedure. So biopsy is a routine to check for cancer.  But what about routinely checking for toxins in suspicious breast mass?  This is never done, to my knowledge. Why not?
So if Axirone is intended for hair growth also, perhaps I might consider it after all, provided that my patients agree.
What do you think?