I have been on the patches for 4 weeks, first one came off after a couple of days and left a residue ring on me. I started putting a product called tegaderm over it and they stay on for the full week and it comes off with no ring. Tegaderm is a breathable film bandage I have seen some people say not to cover the patch and others say the tegaderm is ok.

I'm sure looking forward to a nice pellet so I can relax & not have to deal with this pill/patch stuff any more. Luckily my electrolysis lady that I've used for 2 years uses pellets for her hormone/HRT. She will know the best doc in my area for that. My doc is OK but just a GP doc & will prescribe anything I need but I do not think he has any experience with actually doing pellet implants.

Quote from: FrancisAnn on July 15, 2015, 04:48:19 AM
I'm sure looking forward to a nice pellet so I can relax & not have to deal with this pill/patch stuff any more. Luckily my electrolysis lady that I've used for 2 years uses pellets for her hormone/HRT. She will know the best doc in my area for that. My doc is OK but just a GP doc & will prescribe anything I need but I do not think he has any experience with actually doing pellet implants.

You might ask for bioidentical estrogen.
They might use enough pellets to drive the e well into the female range, its possible you need no further anti androgen then.
Anti androgens also have side effects. If t is driven down to female levels with estro alone you would need no further medication.
( works usually only with implants and injections because bioidentical estrogen applied internally is considered safe).

And you might ask for bioidentical progesterone as implant.
It might help with some side effects of estrogen, even out mood, and help with breast development.


hugs

Laura, thank you so much, I was just ready to send you a PM thank you.

Since I have no experience with pellets any knowledge is appreciated so I can talk more intelligently with this doc. First question is does each pellet release a certain amount of drug per day? How do they know? Are there standard pellets? Who makes the best ones?

Thanks for any knowledge.

Laura, My last blood test was a year ago, E of 186 & no t really, 12. I guess the doc will want new tests which will be OK. My breasts are maybe a B cup, nothing exciting yet, growing too slow it seems. But lots of other nice changes from HRT, body hair almost gone, completion is smoother,......, I'm pretty steady & do not have to high or low mood swings but I will cry sometimes a little but that feels OK. My friends tell me they can tell if I'm having an estrogen rush.  Thanks

Depending on where you are there are different sources for pellets.
One source are compounding pharmacies, they even deliver worldwide to med personnel.

For example
collegepharmacy.com/images/download/CollegePharmacy_Fused_Pellet_General.pdf

They provide further infos concerning application.
They even provide a list of endos working with their products if asked.

According to one of their sheets, pellets with their highest estro dose might produce serum levels of nearly 80-120pg/ml .
Of course reactions might be individual, so have it checked by an endo.
But this is something that can be discussed with a doctor/endo.
(This info is NOT usable for other forms of medication. Like with patches, there is a multiple in efficiency. Patches being in principle more effective, but applied dosage per patch can be thus much lower).


After six months there might be a rest of the pellet remaining, still dissolving slowly. So a new implant dose might possibly be adapted.
Or it might be good to know, so there is no surprise if values are a bit higher.

hugs

That's funny one of the largest compounding pharamist in my city is right down the hall from my GP doc's office. My GP doc maybe able to handle implants. I know & trust him. Thanks so much.

I vote for implant as well!

I was on sublingual E, and got tired of waiting for the stupid thing to dissolve.

With implants, it boils down to how they have been compounded.  The first one I had left a small scar which faded  over 6 months (no worse than a bad scrape).  The second pellet was inserted in the same site, but with a different coating and it agreed much better with me - at 6 months other than a small discolouration, I wouldn't know it was there unless I feel around carefully.

I was on the Dot-patches for 6 months or so and comperate to pills, they were really better and more effective.
I stopped after i got an allergic reaction to them so i switched to gel. They are as effective as patches and are easier to dose. The only downside is that you have to apply them every day. Im always applying them before i go to sleep.
You could try that if you want.

Good luck to all of us to find a safe way for simple estrogen, it should not be so hard. It's tough enough having facial hair zapped, that should be enough pain! We don't deserve any more.

It really pisses me off that we have to hide, use fake names, jump thought hoops for therapist....wiggle our way to find some estrogen that works. Just yesterday I kinda unloaded on my plastic surgeon. I told him we are just nice people, why do so many docs avoid us like the plague......He agreed but so many docs do not.......................Ugggg for us all.   

After reading all the positive experiences people have had with implants, I felt the need to post my experience with them. Before I start, I will not blame the doctor for what happened, her professionalism is not in question.

I had an implant after about a year on oral. It caused my E levels to drop back to 'acceptable' male ranges and all estrogen-based changes stopped, including breast development. My levels were so bad that after a couple of months my doctor put me back on an oral administration route. It's taken me 3 years and a change to patches to restart my breast development. Was it a bad implant? Unlikely, as my gyno had never had one from that implant supplier. Was it that I simply didn't react well to the implant? Possibly, but as I have no plans to try them again, I guess we'll never know.

Quote from: kelly_aus on July 15, 2015, 05:47:25 PM
After reading all the positive experiences people have had with implants, I felt the need to post my experience with them. Before I start, I will not blame the doctor for what happened, her professionalism is not in question.

I had an implant after about a year on oral. It caused my E levels to drop back to 'acceptable' male ranges and all estrogen-based changes stopped, including breast development. My levels were so bad that after a couple of months my doctor put me back on an oral administration route. It's taken me 3 years and a change to patches to restart my breast development. Was it a bad implant? Unlikely, as my gyno had never had one from that implant supplier. Was it that I simply didn't react well to the implant? Possibly, but as I have no plans to try them again, I guess we'll never know.

There is no rule that only one implant should be used. Yet some endos seem to see it that way.
If blood levels are too low dosage is upped with other forms of application as well.
Transgender people are not menopausal cis people in this regard, for whom implants are used as well. They need different doses.

hugs

Quote from: Laura_7 on July 15, 2015, 06:17:48 PM
There is no rule that only one implant should be used. Yet some endos seem to see it that way.
If blood levels are too low dosage is upped with other forms of application as well.
Transgender people are not menopausal cis people in this regard, for whom implants are used as well. They need different doses.

hugs

Other patients of hers, including one of the Admins here, have no problems with her implants, which I was told were nonstandard doses. Even the gyno was surprised by it's lack of efficacy.

And I love how people here will always blame the doctors when something doesn't go quite right, whether it was deserved or not. In this case, the doctor cannot be blamed, as evidenced by her other patients. I believe that doctor uses similar implants herself - as a post-op..

My post was simply a warning that the implants may not be as great for everyone as some people here seem to think. If they've worked for you, great.. But there is a chance it won't work.

Quote from: kelly_aus on July 15, 2015, 06:33:18 PM
Other patients of hers, including one of the Admins here, have no problems with her implants, which I was told were nonstandard doses. Even the gyno was surprised by it's lack of efficacy.

And I love how people here will always blame the doctors when something doesn't go quite right, whether it was deserved or not. In this case, the doctor cannot be blamed, as evidenced by her other patients. I believe that doctor uses similar implants herself - as a post-op..

My post was simply a warning that the implants may not be as great for everyone as some people here seem to think. If they've worked for you, great.. But there is a chance it won't work.

Well there is for example the possibility of an encapsulation...
but there are ways to work around that...

and for example using a few smaller ones instead of one big one... for more surface...

Well it was not meant to blame but to look for a solution...

hugs

Quote from: Laura_7 on July 15, 2015, 06:41:00 PM
Well there is for example the possibility of an encapsulation...
but there are ways to work around that...

and for example using a few smaller ones instead of one big one... for more surface...

Well it was not meant to blame but to look for a solution...

hugs

You don't think this was discussed and the possibility of encapsulation explored? Imaging revealed no encapsulation. For whatever reason, implants were not the solution for me, despite the fact they worked just fine in many of her other patients. Dose wasn't an issue - it was the same as her many of her other patients.

You know what? This is the last time I share any of my personal experiences here. Because they sometimes fall outside of the 'groupthink' realm of reality, either I get treated like an idiot or my medical professionals are made to seem questionable. The gyno in question is not incompetent, far from it.. And as a trans woman herself, I suspect she might have even paid a little more attention to what she was doing.

(Kelly : For what it's worth, I hear you. One of my own experiences - that I had documented liver damage after only a couple months on a dose of E [only] so low that most people swear it wouldn't have any effect at all even for feminization - is frequently taken as up for debate when I mention it. And yes, I trust my doctors and the tests they ran, and I believe it really happened. I'm sorry you feel similarly questioned.)

Good luck to all of us. I'm back on pills until I can find for me a much better soultion which is a pellet it seems. One thing is for sure is that going without my normal hormone of estrogen is not just an option. A nice little pellet that last 4-6 months will be so nice. 

 
Hi all, just a little caution on choice of wording, what may seem fine to you may not read the same to others, we all have different stories and reactions to any discussion in progress

thanks xx

Quote from: kelly_aus on July 15, 2015, 07:29:45 PM
You don't think this was discussed and the possibility of encapsulation explored? Imaging revealed no encapsulation. For whatever reason, implants were not the solution for me, despite the fact they worked just fine in many of her other patients. Dose wasn't an issue - it was the same as her many of her other patients.

You know what? This is the last time I share any of my personal experiences here. Because they sometimes fall outside of the 'groupthink' realm of reality, either I get treated like an idiot or my medical professionals are made to seem questionable. The gyno in question is not incompetent, far from it.. And as a trans woman herself, I suspect she might have even paid a little more attention to what she was doing.

This was all in no way meant to be an allegation but a point for discussion...
Descriptions of personal experiences are valuable.
Its simply that concerning implants, there is both not much literature and not too much experience since its unfortunately not a standard medication for many docs.

From a purely technical point of view, things that might be tested:
-a few small implants instead of one big one. Smaller implants have bigger surface, so absorption might be larger.
-simply trying another place
Well imo its difficult to say how reliable imaging is... sometimes it might be favourable to simply try another location, because there might be so many reasons it did not work out in one place...

But this is all theory.
Its completely understandable you are done for now with trying. Important thing is you have a solution that works for you now, which you seem to have.

Wish you a good time  🙂