Ten mysteries that can easily cause women to get sick

1. Immunity fluctuates

Women have control over their immune systems that men cannot match. Why women have such strong immunity to invading germs, but become incredibly vulnerable when they become pregnant, remains a mystery. It is because of the ups and downs of a woman's own immunity that she is more susceptible to diseases such as lupus and rheumatoid arthritis, which are the result of the immune system producing antibodies against healthy tissues in the body.

2. Heart disease is more deadly

Heart diseases such as angina pectoris are generally more common in men. But once women have heart disease, it is more serious and even fatal. Once the heart is not in good condition, there are often symptoms such as shortness of breath, fatigue and jaw pain, and these symptoms will last for several hours, not just a few minutes. This is a common phenomenon during menopause. As the estrogen level in women decreases at this time, its protective function is relatively weakened.

3. Early prevention of gynecological cancer

The development of medical testing and hormone replacement therapy over the past 50 years has greatly reduced the risk of women developing uterine cancer, ovarian cancer, and cervical cancer. The widespread use of contraceptives and hormone replacement therapy has also greatly reduced the incidence of ovarian cancer and uterine cancer. Recent studies have shown that a low-fat diet may be more effective in preventing cervical cancer.

4. Beware of ligament injuries

In modern society, more and more women are participating in various sports. Orthopedic surgeons remind women to be careful not to get injured. Compared with men, women are more likely to strain the ligaments of their knees during exercise, and once a ligament is strained, it takes several months to heal. Doctors believe this may be related to women's wider hips, which cause the knee ligaments to bear greater forces than men, or it may be that women's ligaments are inherently much more fragile than men's.

5. Slow metabolism

Compared to men, women also metabolize some substances more slowly. For example: alcohol. Women generally drink less than men. Because women's livers have a weak and slow ability to break down alcohol, a large amount of unbroken alcohol dissolves into the blood; aspirin, a painkiller, needs to stay in women's bodies for a long time before it can be effective; women who take oral contraceptives may need to take smaller doses of antidepressants because contraceptives will keep the level of tricyclic antidepressants in the body high.

6. Susceptibility to depression and dementia

Women are more susceptible to depression than men, mainly because women are under greater physiological stress. Women who do not take hormone replacement therapy after menopause are more likely to develop dementia than men of the same age. Evidence shows that the male and female brains respond differently to hormones and brain chemicals.

The serotonin produced in women's bodies is a chemical substance that is controlled by estrogen and affects mood. Women's bodies produce less serotonin than men, and women are more sensitive and stronger in response to changes in serotonin.

7. Half of the people may get breast cancer

Today's research on breast cancer is mainly focused on how to prevent it in its early stages. Studies have shown that if a woman lives to 70 years old, her chances of developing breast cancer are as high as 56%. With the continuous deepening and optimization of research on surgical treatment, drug treatment, chemotherapy and radiotherapy, the methods of conquering breast cancer are also changing with each passing day and increasing.

8. Digestive system is prone to disease

Even if men and women eat the same amount of food, women take much longer to digest it than men. Women are three times more likely to suffer from chronic constipation and twice as likely to suffer from intestinal diseases as men. The difference obviously starts with chewing. Preliminary research suggests that women's saliva has a different chemical composition than men's, which may make the process of food digestion in women seem slow and time-consuming.

9. The pain is more intense

Many research reports have pointed out that women experience more intense and more frequent pain than men. This shows that the perception of pain and the degree of pain attenuation are different between the two sexes. A study of dental patients showed that painkillers such as pentazocine are more effective in women than in men, but women are not as responsive as men to nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs such as ibuprofen.

10. Bone atrophy is more common

Many more women than men suffer from severe bone atrophy in old age. The bones of menopausal women often become less dense and full of holes due to the influence of osteoporosis. This change is mainly due to the decrease in estrogen secretion during menopause. Estrogen can slow down bone loss. For postmenopausal women, if hormone replacement therapy is used, the success rate in preventing bone atrophy can reach 75%, and the risk of hip fracture can be reduced by 50%.