Soy Found Unhelpful in Menopause

Soy supplements don’t reduce hot flashes or maintain bone strength in women after menopause, a new study finds. In fact, women in the study who received soy actually ended up having more hot flashes. The study included 248 women between ages 45 and 60. All of them were past menopause. They were randomly divided into 2 groups. One group took supplements containing isoflavones, a component of soy, for 2 years. The other group took placebo (fake) pills. By the end of the study, there was no difference between groups for most menopause symptoms. But nearly half of the soy group had hot flashes, compared with one-third of the placebo group. Bone loss in the spine was similar for both groups. But among women with low vitamin D levels, those who received the soy pills did have less bone loss. The journal Archives of Internal Medicine published the study.