A smaller HRT patch for less irritated skin.
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Vivelle-Dot is an estrogen patch you wear on your skin. It’s used in HRT and helps to relieve menopause symptoms like hot flashes, night sweats and low mood.
Take our consultation to get HRT recommendations from an expert. Order Vivelle-Dot online to get it shipped to your home, and easily schedule repeat deliveries.
Vivelle-Dot is an estrogen-only patch used in HRT. It contains a man-made hormone called estradiol, which works in a similar way to estrogen in the body. Using Vivelle-Dot can help to reduce menopausal symptoms like hot flashes, mood swings, night sweats, and vaginal dryness. The patch is placed on your skin, and only needs to be changed twice a week, so it’s a helpful alternative to tablets if you’d prefer not to have to take something every day.
When you take HRT, the medications you use will depend on whether or not you’ve had a hysterectomy. Normally, if you’ve had a hysterectomy, you’ll be recommended estrogen-only HRT. But if you haven’t, you’ll take combined HRT.
So, because Vivelle-Dot is an estrogen-only HRT, you can take it on its own if you’ve had a hysterectomy. If you haven’t had this procedure and your uterus is ‘intact’, you’ll need to take a progesterone medication alongside Vivelle-Dot. When it’s given as an estrogen-only treatment, you’ll use it continuously (so have a patch on every day of the month, without a break). If you’re using it alongside a progesterone treatment, you’ll normally use Vivelle-Dot as a ‘cyclical’ or ‘sequential’ treatment (so use it for three weeks, then take a week off, then use it for the next three weeks and so on).
An advantage of Vivelle-Dot is that it’s smaller than other patches like Climara and Estraderm (about the size of a postage stamp), so covers a smaller area and may be less likely to cause skin irritation.
The active ingredient in Vivelle-Dot is estradiol. It’s a synthetic version of estrogen, a hormone that’s central to the female reproductive system. Estrogen plays an important role in menstruation and ovulation, and when you reach a certain age, levels of this hormone in the body start to decline. When this happens, it’s the start of menopause (the first phase is called ‘perimenopause’), and it most commonly occurs between the ages of 45 and 55.
Although it’s completely normal and natural, this drop in estrogen can cause symptoms like vaginal dryness, sleeping problems, and hot flashes. A lot of women also find that they feel more irritable and fatigued.
Vivelle-Dot patches release estradiol into the body at a measured rate, which helps to supplement falling levels of estrogen. This helps to relieve menopause symptoms, and over time you can manage the drop in estrogen more gradually by reducing the dose.
Estrogen therapy is recognized as being the most effective treatment for vasomotor symptoms (also known as menopause symptoms). Because patches like Vivelle-Dot deliver estrogen through the skin, they can be given in lower doses than oral tablets, and are less likely to cause side effects related to blood clotting, cardiovascular problems, and gallbladder disease.
An added benefit of estrogen therapy is that it can reduce the risk of osteoporosis; a condition where the bones become fragile, and prone to breaks and fractures. A study into the effectiveness of transdermal patches (like Vivelle-Dot) at lowering loss of bone mineral density found that, in people who used estrogen patches, bone mineral density in the lower spine was 3.4% higher after one year of patch use, and 3.7% higher after two years of patch use than at baseline (or in other words, before patch use began).
How we source info.
When we present you with stats, data, opinion or a consensus, we’ll tell you where this came from. And we’ll only present data as clinically reliable if it’s come from a reputable source, such as a state or government-funded health body, a peer-reviewed medical journal, or a recognised analytics or data body. Read more in our editorial policy.
You’ll get a detailed set of instructions for Vivelle-Dot in the package insert that comes with the medication. Make sure you follow this, and any additional instructions given by your clinician when using it.
But, just so you can get an idea, here’s a brief summary of the instructions:
You’ll be prescribed a progesterone medication to take alongside Vivelle-Dot if you haven’t had a hysterectomy, and use Vivelle-Dot ‘cyclically’. This means that you’ll wear a Vivelle-Dot patch for three weeks continuously before having a seven-day break, and then start it again and follow the same cycle.
If you’ve had a hysterectomy, you can use Vivelle-Dot continuously without a break, and you won’t need to take a progesterone treatment alongside it.
Cutting Vivelle-Dot patches into smaller pieces isn’t recommended, because it isn’t known how this may affect how well the patch works. The patch also needs to be applied immediately after it’s been removed from the packaging, so storing the other half of the patch may cause it to lose effectiveness.
If you want to decrease the dose you use, it’s better to talk to your clinician – they may be able to prescribe a lower dose patch for you.
Your clinician will advise you on he best dose to use, but generally, you’ll start on:
The number you see for the dose (for example 0.0375mg) relates to how much of the active ingredient is released through the skin patch per day (so 0.0375mg/day).
You’ll have a dose review with a clinician usually every three to six months, where you can let them know if the dose is working well enough for you. If it isn’t, there are higher doses (0.05mg, 0.075mg and 0.1mg) you can try to see if they work better at controlling your symptoms.
If you feel like your Vivelle-Dot dosage is too high or too low, and not controlling your menopause symptoms, let your clinician know. They may be able to suggest a higher dosage, or recommend a different treatment for you if they think that’s a better option.
You can do this by logging in to your Treated account and sending the clinician a message.
How we source info.
When we present you with stats, data, opinion or a consensus, we’ll tell you where this came from. And we’ll only present data as clinically reliable if it’s come from a reputable source, such as a state or government-funded health body, a peer-reviewed medical journal, or a recognised analytics or data body. Read more in our editorial policy.
Have something specific you want to know? Search our info below, or ask our experts a question if you can’t find what you’re looking for.
Newer hormonal therapies: Lower doses; oral, transdermal, and vaginal formulations. Cleveland Clinic Journal of Medicine. Vol. 74, No. 5.
Risks, Benefits, and Treatment Modalities of Menopausal Hormone Therapy: Current Concepts. Frontiers in Endocrinology, 12.
The Effects of Transdermal Estrogen Delivery on Bone Mineral Density in Postmenopausal Women: A Meta-analysis. Iranian Journal of Pharmaceutical Research : IJPR, [online] 16(1), pp.380–389.
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