Nancymd

A new paper from the Orthopaedic Research Society just said something that every woman in midlife needs to hear.

In mouse models of aging-related OA, female mice naturally maintain high estrogen levels — unlike human women, who lose estrogen at menopause. That difference matters enormously, because estrogen loss is one of the key drivers of accelerated joint degeneration in women.

So when researchers say a drug or treatment "didn't work" in animal studies... it's worth asking whether the animal model actually reflected the hormonal reality of the human women those therapies are meant to help.
Women develop OA at higher rates after menopause. We have more pain, more functional limitation, and historically less research designed around our biology.

This is why I talk about hormones and joints in the same breath. They are not separate conversations.

Follow me for more research translated into what actually matters for your body.

Your bones are listening to your body. Let that sink in.

New research in Stem Cells Translational Medicine dives deep into osteocytes — the cells embedded inside your bone that sense mechanical forces and direct bone regeneration. They are your skeleton's internal communication network.

This is the science behind why load-bearing exercise matters for bone health, why sedentary behavior accelerates bone loss, and why regenerative medicine is advancing so rapidly.

me: dismissing bone health as "just take calcium and hope for the best" also me: reading about mechanotransduction pathways and bone tissue engineering at 11pm

This is the future of joint and bone care — and it's available now at Form & Function Orthopaedics in Portland. f2ortho.com — link in bio.

The science is finally catching up to what women have been living in their bodies for decades.

A new editorial in Frontiers in Aging spotlights women at the forefront of musculoskeletal aging research — and if you've ever been told your joint pain is "just part of getting older" or dismissed because it doesn't show up on imaging, this is for you.

Your bones, joints, and muscle don't age the same way a man's do. Perimenopause and menopause are inflection points for your musculoskeletal health. The research is starting to say it clearly. I've been saying it in the clinic for years.

This is why representation in medicine matters — not just who's in the room, but who's being studied.

If you're ready to take your joint health seriously, visit us at Form & Function Orthopaedics. Link in bio — f2ortho.com

Beyoncé wore her skeleton to the Met Gala.

Don’t sleep on yours.

When I started in orthopedic surgery, women were 6% of the field. That number has likely doubled since then. Still a minority. But real progress.

And history tells us this is not new.

At a time when gender roles were far more rigid than today, women ran factory lines, riveted aircraft, and mastered deeply technical, physically demanding work. They built things with their hands in fields that were considered exclusively male.

Sound familiar?

Women in surgery. Women in engineering. Women in every hard field we were told was not ours. The pattern is the same. So is the outcome.

We keep showing up anyway. And the field keeps changing.

Follow to learn more about women in medicine and what we are building next.

Video Credit:

Joking aside, I talk a lot about longevity. About protecting your joints, your bone density, your strength, so you can stay in the game longer. And I mean every word of it.

But longevity isn’t just about the body you’re building for the future. It’s about being present enough to actually live in the one you have right now.

I was recently on vacation with my family. I put the phone down. I watched my kid - growing faster than I ever imagined. I stood in front of something big - the ocean, the lava from a volcano - that reminded me how small and lucky I am at the same time. Mother nature has a way of doing that.

That is what we are preserving function for. Not just to move well, but to be fully there for the moments that matter.

Your body will ask for your attention eventually. I’d rather help you get ahead of it.

If you’re in midlife and ready to understand where your musculoskeletal health actually stands, visit F2ortho.com and sign up to be kept in the loop.

Follow for more real talk about your joints, your health, and getting more life out of your body.

Packed these in the water bottle holder of my backpack before my Hawaii trip and they earned every inch of that real estate. I used the Hyperice Normatec Go 3x on the trans-Pacific flight to support circulation - because sitting that long is genuinely hard on your legs - and then every night after long days hiking the volcano and exploring the island for recovery.

They came home with me and I’m already thinking about every road trip, long travel day, and hard workout they’ll show up for.

Here’s what I loved: no app, no manual syncing, the pairs connect automatically, and the battery life handled everything I threw at it. As a surgeon who spends a lot of time thinking about how we move, recover, and protect our joints over a lifetime, I don’t recommend things casually.

Whether you’re a frequent traveler, someone who trains hard, or just someone whose legs feel heavy at the end of a long day - compression therapy is worth knowing about. And having something this portable means you’ll actually use it.

Thanks to Hyperice for sending me this demo.

My patients can grab a pair directly at the clinic. Everyone else: use the affiliate link in bio for 15% off with free shipping. Recovery is not optional. It should be part of the plan.

👉 https://tidd.ly/3OKmreZ

Standing next to a volcano at night and feeling very small and very alive at the same time.

This is what I think about when I talk about JointSpan. Not a number on a chart. Not a scan result. Not a surgical score.

This. The ability to say yes to the trip. To show up. To feel the heat and the glow and the absolute wildness of being a human being on this planet.

JointSpan is the idea that your musculoskeletal health is not separate from your quality of life. It IS your quality of life. Your joints, your bones, your muscles are the infrastructure that gets you to moments like this one.

And most of us are not thinking about that infrastructure until something breaks. Until we are told we need a replacement. Until the answer is surgery.

I want to change that conversation. I want you thinking about your joints the way you think about your heart, your hormones, your sleep. Because they are just as foundational to how long you live well.

This is why I built JointSpan. And this is why I am not stopping.

Follow along at for more on joint preservation, regenerative medicine, and what it actually means to age on your own terms.

Still grateful for this one.

Earlier this year I was named to the 2026 Portland Montly Top Doctors list for Orthopaedics — voted on by my fellow physicians and healthcare peers.

Peer recognition means something to me because my colleagues see the full picture. The clinical decisions. The patients I fight for. The philosophy behind choosing preservation over replacement whenever it’s possible.

That philosophy is why I built Form & Function Orthopaedics the way I did — and why I keep showing up for patients who were told their only option was surgery or “just live with it.”
There are almost always more options. That’s the work.

If you want to know more about what we do and how we think about joint health differently, f2ortho.com is the place to start.

Here’s what nobody tells you about perimenopause – your mood isn’t just “hormones making you dramatic.” It’s your brain chemistry actually changing. Estrogen affects serotonin, dopamine, and cortisol regulation. So yes, that man just triggered a completely physiologically appropriate response.

And mood changes aren’t equal across the board. Research shows Black women often experience more severe and longer perimenopause transitions. Latina women report higher rates of mood symptoms. Asian women are frequently underdiagnosed because they present differently and are less likely to be asked. This is not one-size-fits-all. It never was.

But here’s what’s getting even less airtime: perimenopause is also doing something to your joints, your tendons, and your bones – right now, and quietly.

Estrogen is a joint protector. When it starts to fluctuate and drop, inflammation goes up. Cartilage thins faster. Tendons become stiffer and more injury-prone. Muscles lose mass faster than at any prior decade. Bone density begins its steepest decline. That “random” shoulder pain, the knee that started aching out of nowhere, the hip stiffness every single morning – that’s not just aging. That’s a hormonal shift with structural consequences nobody warned you about.

Long term? This sets the stage for early joint degeneration, osteoporosis, and the kind of wear that lands women in my OR decades earlier than necessary.

This is why I’m building JointSpan™ – a platform coming soon that treats your musculoskeletal health as the foundation of your longevity. Not a supplement. Not a trend. A science-backed, surgeon-led approach to keeping your joints, bones, and connective tissue strong through every decade of your life. Because protecting your joints in midlife isn’t vanity. It’s strategy.

Follow along for more – I’ll be sharing exactly what perimenopause does to your body and what you can actually do about it.

Follow on IG and on YouTube so you don’t miss the JointSpan™ launch.