Hormone Imbalances cause Inflammation and contribute to AUTOIMMUNITY; Inflammation causes Endocrine dysfunction: Exploring Part6 of my FINDSEX® acronym

Steroidal and peptide hormones have significant immunomodulating properties and a characteristic pattern of hormonal disruption is commonly seen in patients with autoimmunity and inflammatory diseases

Dysendocrinism in Chronic Inflammation: Orthoendocrinology as an Antiinflammatory Approach

This article was originally published as “Orthoendocrinology: An Antiinflammatory Approach to Dysendocrinism” in 2015 by Alex Vasquez, DC, ND, DO, FACN

Steroidal and peptide hormones have significant immunomodulating properties, and a characteristic pattern of hormonal disruption is commonly seen in patients with autoimmunity. Relatively simple natural and/or pharmacologic interventions can be used to safely and effectively correct hormonal disturbances, with the dual benefits of improved overall health and the amelioration of autoimmunity. I have coined the term “orthoendocrinology”‡ to describe this technique of addressing numerous disturbances in endocrine function by using the “right hormones,” based on a similar conceptual model as Linus Pauling’s suggestion that health might be optimized by the use of the “right molecules” (orthomolecular medicine, orthomolecular nutrition) rather than endless reliance on the cyclical prescriptions of what he called “toximolecular” substances.

I will keep this overview and application straightforward, simple, and clinically relevant; readers should appreciate that this therapeutic approach of hormonal optimization is only 1 of 7 major areas of intervention in my anti-rheumatic therapeutic approach for addressing the causes of sustained inflammatory responses, formerly called “chronic inflammation.”

This discussion’s focus on hormones/endocrinology is, in fact, the sixth of the 7 areas of intervention for reducing inflammation:

1. Food

2. Infections

3. Nutritional immunomodulation

4. Dysfunctional mitochondria

5. Sleep, stress, and style of living

6. Endocrinology

7. Xenobiotic immunotoxicity – recalled by the FINDSEX® acronym¹

Of course, these interventions are most effective when employed within a comprehensive treatment plan that includes all components of the overall protocol.

The colorful graphic (Figure 1) illustrates how these 7 factors coalesce to effect immunodysregulation that underlies states of so-called chronic inflammation, seen at its worse in the clinical manifestation of autoimmunity.

Figure 1. Functional Inflammology

Major Concepts

Hormones affect and are affected by inflammatory status. In this section, I will focus on the 7 hormones of greatest significance to inflammatory/autoimmune homeodynamics. Readers should mentally organize this information in the following way: