Gender Relationship?

[kmpower]

Since I am trying to figure out the hormonal connection to my/our symptoms, I wanted to ask something.

I see that most of the posters here are women. That could be for lots of reasons. But are there statistics, studies or doctors' opinions that dysautonomia affects more women than men? Lots of you younger ladies have complained about the aggravation by monthly cycling and a few of us oldies have noticed perhaps a menopausal connection for us. Is it just another factor or are women in general more vulnerable to the dysautonomias?

Thanks.

OLL

[Guest CyberPixie]

I was hear that men have more fluid in their bodies than women, wondering if this makes a difference, maybe more men have POTS than they realise yet dont suffer at all/as much because of this and so don't get diagnosed. Just a theory.

[Ernie]

Hi,

My 3 brothers have POTS and NCS. There are many other of the males in my family who also have the disorder. In my family there is no sex preference or correlation.

[yogini]

I think there are studies about this. I have heard that the number of females to males is 4 to 1 or 5 to 1. It does make sense - women tend to be smaller and smaller animals naturally have less blood volume and more rapid heart rate. This would make us more prone to POTS. I am sure the hormone fluctuations don't help. Lucky us!

[persephone]

80% of sufferers are females of menstruating age. Men do get it, but it's almost always women. The first time I *EVER* fainted was 7 days before my periods started.

[Lukkychrm42]

I was hear that men have more fluid in their bodies than women, wondering if this makes a difference, maybe more men have POTS than they realise yet dont suffer at all/as much because of this and so don't get diagnosed. Just a theory.

Actually, I believe women have more fluid in their bodies than men... at least water is what I'm thinking of.

You're right that there's absolutely a disproportionate number of female sufferers, but I'm not sure why. Just lucky I guess! As for the hormone connection, hmm I wonder. I don't have a cycle, so I don't really know how my 'female' hormones act these days.

It doesn't seem that women would have a proportionately lesser volume of blood than men just because on average we're smaller. A smaller amount, certainly, but not in relation to our height and weight, since that varies from woman to woman, too. Also, a higher resting heart rate wouldn't affect the amount it should go up on standing. Babies have much much higher heart rates than adults, yet a majority of POTS sufferers come into it somewhere around puberty. It would seem that the adolescents who have developmental POTS would be more likely female, but there are probably more men in the groups that have it related to viruses or genetic conditions (hyperadrenergic POTS or EDS, fx).