Can PCOS And Hair Loss Really Be Related?

There are a lot of treatment plans for PCOS but if left unchecked could be the causation of hair thinning. The major immediate remedy for PCOS is to identify a means to bring down the weight of the person.

So much emphasis is made on proper eating habits these days that it seems to go without heed. However in cases of obesity this may be the culprit for hair loss.

The symptoms of PCOS include weight gain, irregular periods, fertility problems and thinning of hair.

Knowing that there are a lot of reasons why women experience this hair malady sometimes it's best to eliminate the obvious. The process of elimination is a good strategy to identify the cause of hair loss that can prove or disprove a disease.

The thought of even having this type of disease never crosses the mind of women because they can't associate their weight with the loss of their hair. Yet this can be a real issue and having a treatment plan to regulate body weight can be a solution for this.

Getting back on track with a healthy diet plan can benefit both the body and the hair at the same time. It's never too late to start with some type of diet plan that can start with regular exercise.

Of course you should check with your regular physician and have yourself diagnosed but insuring that your body receives the proper nutrients can only help you in the long run.

PCOS and hair loss can be a temporary condition if you have it diagnosed and go on a preventive treatment plan that will help you.

It's probably no secret to you, if you're here reading this, that PCOS is a type of endocrine disorder that can strike you at nearly any point in your life. It's also probably known to you already what PCOS is and what is believed to cause it--an inability to deal with glucose and an insulin intolerance in your body.

All of these things combined can cause a condition in your body where the ovaries begin to work less and to create symptoms that are difficult for you to handle over a long period of time.

Among the things that your PCOS can cause are:

*Infertility
*Excessive hair growth
*Cramping and Pain
*Multiple ovarian cysts

One of the most important parts of PCOS and helping to control it is your diet. PCOS diets need to be well controlled and to eliminate many different things from the diet that may be causative agents of some of the problems. Given that insulin intolerance is one of the major parts of PCOS, a PCOS diet may be able to help you to lose some of those symptoms.

PCOS is in fact one of the most common endocrine disorders and the onset of it typically brings you symptoms that are given by more than one or two abnormal cysts which begin to grow on the ovaries.

You will find that a PCOS diet may actually help you with some of these symptoms. Symptoms are plentiful in PCOS and many of these can be controlled by a PCOS diet.

PCOS diet requirements are typically going to be geared at helping you to lose weight, but more, they will also seek to eliminate the chances of further problems that you may see from your insulin resistance, such as early adult onset diabetes. Lowering your fat intake and avoiding carbohydrates particularly processed foods is one of the best ways to help yourself by implementing a PCOS diet.

Carbohydrates tend to be less easily uptaken by the body when one is insulin resistant. It is better for you to steer clear and to eat instead more natural foods with higher fiber. Fresh fruits and vegetables will be best for those who are insulin resistant. Nuts, berries, fresh vegetables and fewer processed foods are the order of the day.

Avoiding sugar or highly sugared or processed foods will also be in your best interests in your PCOS diet. Avoidance of the fruit juices that may be more sugary than fresh fruit, and also staying away from items with high fructose corn syrup or corn sugar is also something you will want to do as much as possible.

A PCOS diet is a more natural and healthful diet. Protein foods are the best way to go for your condition and may help you to lose the weight that is sometimes difficult to lose for the PCOS sufferer. Your PCOS diet, in combination with exercise will go a long way toward helping you to avoid the complications that can take place in PCOS.

Just by watching an hour of TV, or flipping through your favorite magazine you know of the thousands of weight loss "plans" or diets that are around today. For women with PCOS, it may be a bit misleading or confusing.... we know we're supposed to watch our carbs, only eat "good carbs" as this is what best controls our insulin resistance, therefore controlling our PCOS. But the question is, which diet or plan do we choose?

Below are the most common eating plans used by women with PCOS. I say eating plan because I don't consider them "diets". We are not starving ourselves, eating the wrong things for a short amount of time to lose weight, etc. This is a life long choice for us. If we want to control our PCOS and its symptoms, we need to chose an eating plan and stick to it, indefinitely.

Glycemic Index

The glycemic index (GI) is a system used to classify foods with carbohydrates on how fast they raise our blood-sugar levels. There are 3 general categories:

High GI Foods (GI value 70%2B)
These cause a fast rise in blood-glucose levels
Medium GI Foods (GI value 55-69) These cause a medium rise in blood-glucose
Low GI Carb Foods (GI value 54 or less) These cause a slow rise in blood-sugar

This is considered the best option for women with PCOS. A low-GI plan is a balanced diet based with medium and low GI carbs, plus healthy protein and fats (including plenty of healthy whole grains as well as fruits and vegetables. A great plan to follow is Weight Watchers, as they base their meals on the Glycemic index principal.

South Beach Diet

The SBD consists of lean proteins, healthy fats and oils, nuts, seeds, and fresh vegetables and fruits and is a favorable diet for PCOS. The theory is if you cut back on carbs, and eat a higher percentage of protein that your body will have less insulin responses to carbs. It consists of three phases, where you slowly add more carbs back into your meals. The point of the first phase is to get rid of cravings that PCOS'ers have for carbs by eliminating them completely. Then, as good carbs are added into back, you are less likely to lose control and binge. The types of carbs allowed on the SBD are those that score low on the glycemic index.

The Zone Diet

The Zone Diet is about balancing your hormones to control hunger on fewer calories but still getting the nutrients your body needs for long-term health. The Zone is a moderate-carbohydrate, moderate-protein, moderate fat diet that has approximately one gram of fat for every two grams of protein and three grams of carbs. These dietary ratios are based off of the dietary recommendations from the Joslin Diabetes Research Center at Harvard Medical School for the treatment of obesity and type 2 diabetes.

The Zone's meals include:

Low-fat protein
Low glycemic-load carbs (mostly fruits and vegetables)
Heart-healthy monounsaturated fats
Warning !!!!

Another common "low carb" plan is The Atkins diet. This is NOT recommended for women with PCOS, in fact it should be avoided completely. The Atkins diet has been associated with a large number of heart related conditions and even death. It focuses on completely removing carbs, and eating high fat, unhealthy proteins (such as hamburger, bacon, etc) which is why we need to stay FAR away.

Women with PCOS already have a higher risk of heart disease, high cholesterol/blood pressure and stroke, so adding a diet high in fatty proteins would only increase our risk. Plus, starving your body of the carbs it needs to survive only increases the risk even more.

Millions of women around the world are unable to conceive due to Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome, or PCOS, a complex reproductive disease or infertility problem. PCOS may or may not involve cysts in the ovaries, but always involves insulin resistance that causes the ovaries to absorb too much sugar and produce testosterone.

In the case of PCOS the body secretes far too much androgen, the male hormone, which counteracts the ovaries' ability to make enough progesterone necessary for a normal cycle. The estrogen level is OK; but the level of the luteinizing hormone (LH) is actually higher than usual. The luteinizing hormone is actually working overtime in an attempt to kick-start the cycle. Due to the high androgen levels interfering with the follicle stimulating hormone (FSH), progesterone is not triggered. In other words your follicles don't develop... instead they turn into pea-sized cysts on your ovaries. The ovaries can then enlarge.

Because the male hormone levels are out of whack you may develop:

facial hair
hair on other parts of your body
a balding issue
acne
obesity
irregular periods

Researchers at the Royal Alfred Hospital, Macquarie University, and the University of Sydney in Australia recently ran a clinical trial to see whether a low glycemic index (low-GI) diet might help women with PCOS achieve pregnancy more quickly.

The Australian researchers gave the women in their study two very simple options:

1. Follow a diet of 'ordinary foods' eaten in carefully prescribed quantities, or

2. Eat any foods they liked, as long as they were low on the glycemic index. Low glycemic index (low-GI) foods release sugars slowly into the bloodstream.

The purpose of both diets was to treat insulin resistance, not full-fledged Type 2 diabetes. Many women who have untreated PCOS, however, eventually develop Type 2 diabetes.

At the end of a year, half of the women who started their diets had managed to stay on plan or to 'graduate' from their diets after losing 7 per cent of their total body weight. Among the women who followed a strict, calorie-restricted plan, 63% had resumed having normal menstrual periods, a strong indication their fertility had returned. Among women who ate whatever foods they liked from a low-GI list, however, 95% had resumed having normal menstrual periods.

In PCOS, fertility returns when insulin resistance is reversed. The results of this study suggest that Type 2 diabetics, as well, may do better when they resolve to eat:

low-fat meats
fish
fruits and
vegetables

...rather than counting carbs and calories in highly processed foods.

Insulin resistance and PCOS go hand in hand. Women with insulin resistance are either at risk for, or have been diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes.