Hot Topics in the Management of Perimenopause & Menopause: A Conventional & Integrative Approach – FREE CE Session

This session is presented by FNU faculty members Dr. Ruth Ellen Elsasser and Dr. Ana Verzone

This session will provide a review of the most common conventional and evidence-based integrative medicine interventions used during perimenopause and menopause.

At the completion of this session, you will be able to:

• Understand menopause and its varied presentation and symptoms.
• Know the key differences between perimenopause and menopause.
• Know how to properly diagnose menopause.
• Understand the conventional approach to managing peri/menopause.
• Understand integrative approaches to managing peri/menopause.
• Know how diet, exercise, and lifestyle impact symptoms.
• Identify complications of conventional pharmacology.
• Identify the limitations of integrative therapies.
• Know how to develop a patient-centered, individualized plan of care when managing perimenopause and menopause.

About CE Credits

This activity is approved for 2.0 contact hour(s) of continuing education (which includes 0.75 hours of pharmacology) by the American Association of Nurse Practitioners. Activity ID 20084431. This activity was planned in accordance with AANP Accreditation Standards and Policies. This activity’s approval expires on September 30, 2021.

Once you have viewed the session, you must complete the post-test and evaluation at the link below in order to receive credit for your contact hours. If you have questions about completion of the activity or the evaluation form, please contact Eileen.Odonnell@frontier.edu.

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Presenters

Ruth Ellen Elsasser, DNP, FNP-BC, CNE

Dr. Ruth Elsasser is a family nurse practitioner and integrative and functional medicine provider. As course faculty for Frontier Nursing University for over five years, Dr. Elsasser has taught Epidemiology and Biostatistics, The Nurse Educator, and most recently, Advanced Pharmacology. Ruth has worked in a myriad of clinical settings including most recently, as an integrative and functional medicine provider and consultant in a small private practice. Dr. Elsasser has also practiced in a rural primary-care setting serving the under-insured and uninsured, in a clinic serving primraily migrant farmworkers in rural Oregon; as well as for a large multi-specialty group on the East Coast, where she managed a large panel of chronically ill patients. Ruth has attended numerous courses in Functional Medicine through the Institute of Functional Medicine and the Kresser Institute. Currently, Dr. Elsasser is earning her Ayurvedic Health Counselor certification at the California College of Ayurveda. Ruth’s passion is combining the wisdom and knowledge of both allopathic and integrative medicine, as she believes multiple modalities are often needed to both prevent and treat disease processes. Dr. Elsasser is a member of the North American Menopause Society, the National Ayurvedic Medical Association, National Organization of Nurse Practitioner Faculties, National League of Nurses, and Oregon Nursing Association. Dr. Elsasser is also a certified nurse educator. In her free time, Ruth spends her time in nature with her family enjoying many outdoor activities such as hiking, mountain-biking, skiing, swimming, and trail running.

Ana Verzone, DNP, FNP-BC, CNM

Dr. Ana Verzone is an FNP and CNM, working with rural populations since 2004. She has taught at Frontier Nursing University since 2018 in the Doctor of Nursing Practice and Family Nurse Practitioner programs and previously taught in the University of Alaska’s FNP program from 2016-2018. Ana is passionate about global and rural health and training excellent clinicians who take into account the wholeness of a patient. Currently living in Alaska, she has worked in various settings, including with the Rural Anchorage Service Unit and Alaska Native Medical Center providing primary, urgent, and emergency care in rural Alaska, as a hospitalist midwife with Providence Medical Center, and as a provider at an Integrative Medicine clinic in Anchorage. She enjoys international volunteer work and has served in Uganda, Indonesia, the Dominican Republic, Nepal, and more. When not teaching, Ana loves playing in the mountains with her daughter, husband, and dog – especially flyfishing, climbing, and exploring in the wilderness of Alaska.