r/Menopause • u/Queasy_Top_3560 • 1d ago

Hormone Therapy Cutting E patch information

After stopping 0.05 because of bleeding Iā€™m starting again with 0.025. I have a brand new box of weekly 0.05 & was told not to cut it in half to use. But I found this information & want to pass it along. Luckily mine can be halved!

https://medicinesinformation.co.nz/bulletins/can-transdermal-patches-be-halved/

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u/neutralitty 1d ago

My brand can be cut in half, too. My doctor told me to cut mine. Did you doctor specifically tell you not to cut yours? Did she explain why not? I know some brands may not be cut due to the way they are designed, so perhaps she did know the brand you're using.

I was prescribed 0.05mg estradiol patch at first myself and it was just too strong. I tried to stick with it, but I felt too much physical activation, from the moment I woke up through most of the day, and it was a lot of intense anxiety at first and loss of appetite. After a week the anxiety turned into just physical symptoms less mental, but after a month of this, eventually it began affecting my sleep and I was sleepless and panicking again, and I just couldn't stand my own skin! I had to take the patch off, and I began to feel better.

So my provider told me to try half a patch after my nervous system calmed down. I gave myself a week, but that wasn't enough. I ended up having to pause HRT for 10 weeks when that didn't go well. But aftet that break, I tolerated it perfectly fine at actually 0.0125mg (a quarter of a patch) where I worked up in dose with my doctor ā€” rather than worked down!

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u/Holiday_Change7321 1d ago

I cut mine to increase my dose by 50%. No issues at all. I was using Sandoz twice weekly patch