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How well do you know PCOS? Find out now!

PCOS can be uncomfortable, debilitating – and mysterious. Take our quiz to test your knowledge about this life-changing condition – and what you can do about it!

How many American women have PCOS?

Over 5 million. A lot of PCOS sufferers are never diagnosed, but research indicates that 5-10% of women of childbearing age in the USA have PCOS.

What are the causes of PCOS?

All of the above. In conventional medicine, doctors say the cause of PCOS is unknown. At WHN, we believe that many factors combine to damage the body’s self-regulatory mechanisms, and over time one lasting result can be PCOS.

Is PCOS reversible?

It varies. For many women, PCOS is incurable, but there are therapies to manage the symptoms. For others, PCOS can be partly or fully reversed with a program of dietary changes, nutritional supplements and increased physical activity. Sometimes the body holds onto an equilibrium state, even when it’s unhealthy – a phenomenon called “homeostasis” – so improvements may require patience and determination.

What are the most common symptoms of PCOS?

PCOS has many symptoms, and that’s one reason it takes on average more than two years to diagnose. Many of these symptoms also occur for other reasons, and the diagnosis is usually multi-modal, possibly requiring a medical history, blood tests, scans and analysis. That’s a big reason so few women are happy with their treatment or the information they receive about PCOS from their doctors.

What other medical conditions are associated with PCOS?

PCOS is not simply uncomfortable – this kind of chronic damage to our self-regulatory systems can lead to a host of serious health conditions or disease. There is evidence that efforts to rebalance your endocrine system mitigates the risk of these serious conditions, but more research is needed.

Weight loss cures PCOS.

False. Weight gain, and especially obesity, are known to be contributing factors in the development of PCOS for most women. But you can get PCOS without being overweight, and losing weight is no guarantee of reversing PCOS once you have it. There is evidence that weight loss is helpful, however.

Women with PCOS can’t have children.

False. Another example of how wrong it is to oversimplify PCOS! Some women with PCOS are able to get pregnant without any treatment. Others are able to partially mitigate their symptoms and get pregnant. Yet others are able to eliminate all their symptoms and still find themselves unable to conceive. Women and their doctors have to be knowledgeable, determined – and patient.

PCOS is always caused by poor life choices.

False. There’s a very clear connection between PCOS and familial history. We can’t be sure whether that connection is genetic or epigenetic (i.e. heritable but not genetic), but if your mother or sister has PCOS, your odds of also having it are much higher. This family predilection doesn’t account for a majority of cases, and may only be one factor – but it’s a major factor.

The treatment offered by alternative medicine for PCOS is more effective than conventional medicine’s.

Sometimes. PCOS is at root a breakdown of the body’s self-regulatory processes, which is a holistic problem, not something that arises from a single cause. But conventional medicine is reductive, and naturally tries to match a single cause to a single therapy or pharmaceutical solution. In addition, the kind of holistic approach recommended by alternative medicine – combining dietary changes, nutritional supplements, exercise and lifestyle habits – is outside the scope of the specialist model of modern medicine. At WHN we usually recommend you pursue the alternative approach whether that is your only therapy or you are using it as adjunct therapy to improve the efficacy of your conventional treatment.