Podcast: How Do Endocrine Disruptors Impact Our Health?

Dr. Rosser: Endocrine disruptors are found in our everyday products, and over time there's a cumulative effect. So what can we do? Paying attention to what we're buying, what we are putting in our bodies. Just think about little changes that you can make. 

Courtney: Welcome to Health Matters, your bi-weekly dose of the latest in health and wellness from NewYork-Presbyterian. I'm Courtney Allison. 

Courtney: This season on Health Matters, we're covering your health from A to Z, asking our experts to break down the health topics and wellness trends we're all curious about. Today, it's E for endocrine disruptors. We're taking a look at how external chemicals can alter the way our hormones behave. To help us better understand the critical role hormones play in our bodies, we talk to obstetrician-gynecologist Dr. Mary Rosser, the director of Integrated Women’s Health at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center. She explains how our endocrine system works and how external disruptors can interfere with hormones. And Dr. Rosser shares some practical tips on how we can all limit our exposure and make informed decisions about our daily choices that ultimately protect our health. 

Courtney: Dr. Rosser, welcome back to Health Matters. 

Dr. Rosser: Thank you very much, Courtney. It's so wonderful to be here. 

Courtney: So Dr. Rosser, we're here today to talk about endocrine disruptors. First, can we lay out the basics? What are hormones, and what is the endocrine system? 

Dr. Rosser: So hormones are basically chemical messengers that are produced by glands in our body called the endocrine system, and these messengers travel throughout the body, and they actually regulate our internal systems. They control everything and every organ from growth to metabolism to our reproductive process to our moods and even sleep patterns. They work by a lock-and-key method, meaning they bind to receptors in cells, and then this produces a cascade of events that occurs in the cells. An example would be insulin. It regulates our glucose, our sugar in our body. So when there's too much glucose, the insulin is released so that it can work to eliminate that glucose or process it. The thyroid hormones regulate our metabolism. Estrogen and testosterone, which are both produced by men and women, regulate our reproductive system. And cortisol, which helps to manage stress. 

Courtney: So it seems like the endocrine system maintains just this beautiful, delicate balance in our body, and so what disrupts that? What are endocrine disruptors? 

Dr. Rosser: Endocrine disruptors are outside or external substances that come into our body, so that really could be anything that's grown or manufactured. And they can interfere with this delicate endocrine system and hormone balance, and they can do that through a variety of mechanisms. First, they can mimic the natural hormone by binding to the receptor. They then will block the hormone from binding to the receptor. This will alter how the hormones are produced, it can alter how they're broken down, and it can also change how the receptors in the cells behave. 

Courtney: I appreciate you describing how these endocrine disruptors actually disrupt our system. The way you describe it, it, it almost sounds like it hijacks a hormone. 

Dr. Rosser: It does, and it can alter the way the hormone works in our body, so you don't have that beautiful, delicate balance and feedback loop because you've got something interfering with it. 

Courtney: To clarify, how can these disruptors get into our systems? Through foods? Through the air too? 

Dr. Rosser: It can be what we call transdermal, so through the skin. So if you put a lotion on your body or an oil, you wanna think about that. Ingestion of food, liquids, and also, yes, through the respiratory system. We also need to talk about secondhand smoke. That's an excellent example of endocrine disruptors. There can also be contaminated food and water sources. Disruptors can come in through our personal care products. That includes cosmetics, hair products, pesticides that are used to grow our food, flame retardants, cleaning supplies that we use every day, and all of the things we buy over the counter. 

Courtney: Why is the system so sensitive to certain chemicals in these disruptors? 

Dr. Rosser: Because there is a delicate balance, and it's been set up through mother nature to work really perfectly, so anything that is brought into it will disrupt it, and that can lead to chronic illnesses, health outcomes that are poor, et cetera. 

Courtney: What kind of health conditions can result from hormonal imbalances or from this disrupting of the system? 

Dr. Rosser: The thyroid hormones regulate our metabolism. Also, insulin that regulates our glucose. Alterations in these hormones and their activity can lead to metabolic disorders, including obesity, which we know is such a serious problem. And then we can continue with reproductive issues, so impaired fertility. Sperm quality can be decreased. It can also cause hormone-sensitive cancers like breast cancer, prostate cancer, and testicular cancers. 9/11, there-are people that were exposed to all of the fumes in the air and the emissions after nine eleven and you see a lot of cancers that have been diagnosed due to their exposure at that time. 

Courtney: You mentioned endocrine disruptors could impact fertility. Could you elaborate on that? 

Dr. Rosser: When we're talking about egg development, it's not just the number of eggs, but it's the quality of the eggs. Endocrine disruptors can get into that and disrupt the mechanisms, not just destroying the number, but destroying the quality of the eggs. The DNA is housed within the nucleus within the cell. The hormone binds to its receptor so that it can act- 

Courtney: Mm-hmm 

Dr. Rosser: ... on the cell. If an endocrine disruptor acts like a hormone and binds to that receptor, it can get into the nucleus and alter the DNA. If your egg DNA has been altered and then it, there's fertilization, then you may have an anomalous embryo. We've also found that the endocrine disruptors may delay conception- 

Courtney: Wow 

Dr. Rosser: ... or time to pregnancy. There was a study of seven hundred couples in China. They measured urinary BPA or bisphenol A concentrations in women's urine, and what they found was the higher the BPA concentration in the urine, the longer the time to pregnancy or conception. So there you can actually see what's happening. We also talk about endocrine disruptors when women are pregnant, all along the development and growth phases. And so that's really important, and this is one of the reasons why I think women watch everything that they do when they're pregnant. 

Courtney: So we come into contact with potential endocrine disruptors every day. Is there an immediate effect that they have, or are we talking about an impact on our body that builds up over time? 

Dr. Rosser: Endocrine disruptors are found in our everyday products. You can be exposed to multiple endocrine disruptors throughout the day and throughout your life. And over time, there's a cumulative effect. So what can we do? Paying attention to what we're buying, what we are putting in our bodies. I tell people to try as much as you can to choose organic and whole foods. You want to stay away from processed. I know that can be very hard because organic foods are not readily available. Uh, they are also very expensive, but I think this is getting to be a little bit easier, and you just have to pay attention to where you're shopping. 

Courtney: In thinking about what you're saying, you know, just last night, I went grocery shopping. I'm trying to eat more healthy. I bought mushrooms, I bought spinach, but of course it's wrapped in plastic. I put moisturizer on this morning, and it looks like there's a hundred ingredients in it. So it's just easy to become overwhelmed. Do you have any advice for someone who wants to be more mindful about what they're putting in their body? 

Dr. Rosser: If you look at the ingredients on everything that you buy, there's some toxins that we want to make sure that we eliminate as much as possible, like BPAs. BPA is bisphenol A. It disrupts multiple hormone receptor systems, and this we find in a lot of products. These disrupt our estrogen receptors, thyroid hormone receptors, and many studies have shown that the BPA exposure is significantly associated with preterm birth, obesity, type two diabetes, cardiovascular disease, hypertension, kidney disease, and even polycystic ovarian syndrome. So you can look at the label, and many times it'll say BPA-free, and so I think that's really important. There's also phthalates. These show associations with male reproductive hormones and toxicity. They disrupt the way that the brain, the hypothalamus, and the pituitary communicate with our ovaries and our testes, and so the hormone production is really interfered with. 

Courtney: So microplastics get a lot of attention these days. What do we know about how these microplastics affect our hormonal balance? 

Dr. Rosser: The microplastic is really just the residual of what is in the plastic. We see a lot about avoiding the plastic containers, not heating in the microwave, using the reusable water bottles that we can just clean and wash at home. We talk about the environment, but this is really about helping us not ingest microplastics. 

Courtney: So looking at labels, being mindful of microplastics, is there any other advice you can share to help us lessen our exposure and intake of endocrine disruptors? 

Dr. Rosser: Your cleaning products, your cosmetics, including just body lotion and soaps, these are not FDA approved. The FDA approval process is very rigorous, and I-I think that many people who use cosmetics all the time are shocked to know that these are not regulated. I think that's something that people need to pay attention to. Cosmetics include the perfumes and fragrances. This is also what happens in the nail salons, right? I tell people, "If you're gonna have your nails done, make sure that you go to a place that has ventilation," especially our pregnant patients. And if people go into a hair salon and have their color done, you know, it touches our scalp, and there have been studies looking at the hair straightening products that have been used over decades and their contribution as endocrine disruptors. And over a period of time, we can see that these come into our bodies, and they certainly break down and they're excreted, but it's the exposure, continued exposure. 

Courtney: Right. It sounds like our body does have a wonderful system, but it, it can only take so much. 

Dr. Rosser: Yeah. And if people can go to their departments of health, like I know the New York Department of Health has really great information about reducing environmental exposure. And find the top sites that might, uh, be able to provide you with more information and transparency. 

Courtney: That's really helpful. I really appreciate all these ways we can empower people and educate them to make informed decisions. 

Dr. Rosser: Masking is actually a great preventative measure for at least what we can get in the respiratory system. If you're cleaning, use a mask, use gloves. 

Courtney: Yeah, that's a great tip. 

Dr. Rosser: I think about cleaning our fruits and vegetables, and if you told me 20 years ago that I needed to clean my cantaloupe or honeydew melon before I put my knife in it, I would've gone, "Are you kidding?" And now I have to say, we clean everything. You don't have to buy fancy sprays to clean your fruits and vegetables. You can use vinegar and water with lemon. You don't have to make huge transitions in your life. When you go to the grocery store or when you're buying online those groceries or those cosmetics, when you go to the hair salon, just think about little changes that you can make. 

Courtney: So how often are you addressing things with patients that look like the result of endocrine disruptors? How common is this problem? 

Dr. Rosser: That's an excellent question. Many times in our practice at Fazzalari Women's Health, these topics do come up. We will ask, especially when it comes to changes in skin and hair, "Have you changed any of your shampoos, your soap, your hand creams? Have you changed any of those products lately?" And I will tell you that when people are asked that question point blank, more often than not, there have been changes. Obesity is the number one driver of all chronic issues. When we're addressing that, we're talking about people eating a clean diet and eliminating processed foods in addition to eliminating excess sugar and alcohol. 

Courtney: And so how can we keep tabs on our hormone levels and endocrine system? Should we be checking in with our doctor or getting certain hormone screenings? 

Dr. Rosser: Keep up with your every-year screening and prevention practices. Make sure that you get those health checkups. Even if you're feeling well, it is so important to do that. And think head to toe. If anything comes up, even if you think, "Oh, this is probably not anything to worry about," if it's persistent or it's worsening, then just make an appointment with your clinician and you'll sleep better. You know yourself, and if you feel that something is wrong, get help. 

Courtney: Can endocrine disruptors leave your system if you really start to make a conscious effort to avoid them? 

Dr. Rosser: Yes, they can. There are studies that have shown that if you decrease or you change your products, then you will definitely see different physical manifestations outwardly. We hear about that with the gut. You know, when people change what they eat, the less processed foods and more organic foods, people's gut does better. 

Courtney: Dr. Rosser, we've talked about so much today. Is there any parting message you have for listeners? 

Dr. Rosser: What we want to do is really raise awareness today, not to frighten people, but to say, "Hey, let's look at the details of what we buy at the store and what we take in." Look at what you consume on a daily basis. You could journal even for just a week and say, "Hmm," you know, "am I using a water bottle every day that's plastic, and can I make the switch to the reusable?" We have done that in my household. So manage what you can manage. 

Courtney: Dr. Rosser, thank you so much for joining us today. It's always a pleasure talking with you. I think this is really gonna help educate a lot of people. Thank you.

Dr. Rosser: Thank you so much for this. Take care. 

Courtney: Our many thanks to Dr. Mary Rosser. I'm Courtney Allison. Health Matters is a production of NewYork-Presbyterian. The views shared on this podcast solely reflect the expertise and experience of our guests. To learn more about Dr. Rosser's work with patients, check out the show notes. NewYork-Presbyterian is here to help you stay amazing at every stage of your life. Join us next time when we discuss what to know about flora and our gut health, and why gut health matters for your whole body. That's in two weeks right here on Health Matters. So you don't miss it, be sure to follow and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get podcasts.