SubQ Testosterone for Women’s Hormone Support Options

SubQ Testosterone for Women’s Hormone Support

Abstract

Testosterone is an important hormone in women’s health, even though it is often associated mainly with men. Women naturally produce testosterone through the ovaries and adrenal glands, and levels generally decline with age. For carefully selected women, medically supervised testosterone therapy may help with specific symptoms, particularly hypoactive sexual desire disorder (HSDD) after menopause.

Subcutaneous testosterone injections deliver a very small amount of testosterone into the fatty tissue just beneath the skin rather than deep into a muscle. This approach may offer convenient dosing and easier adjustment, but the strongest clinical trial evidence for testosterone therapy in women still involves transdermal preparations such as patches, creams, and gels. At Wellness Doctor RX in El Paso, an integrative approach can connect medical hormone evaluation with functional medicine, nutrition, chiropractic care, exercise, and rehabilitation. This whole-person strategy addresses both hormonal health and the muscles, joints, movement patterns, and metabolic factors that influence how a woman feels and functions.

Understanding Testosterone in Women’s Health

Testosterone is not only a male hormone. Women naturally produce it throughout adult life. The ovaries and adrenal glands contribute to testosterone production, and circulating levels tend to decline as women age. Surgical removal of the ovaries can cause a more sudden decline (Davison et al., 2005).

Testosterone interacts with many tissues throughout the female body, including the brain, muscles, bones, reproductive system, and skin.

It is involved in areas such as:

• Sexual desire and arousal
• Muscle physiology
• Bone metabolism
• Energy metabolism
• Red blood cell production
• Mood and motivation pathways
• Body composition
• Physical function

However, having a biological role does not automatically mean testosterone therapy has been proven to treat every problem associated with those systems.

The strongest scientific evidence for systemic testosterone therapy in women is for postmenopausal women with hypoactive sexual desire disorder when the loss of sexual desire causes personal distress (Davis et al., 2019; Parish et al., 2021).

The Worldborne Medical whitepaper supplied for this article similarly explains that improvements in desire, arousal, pleasure, orgasm, satisfaction, and sexual distress have the strongest randomized evidence, while benefits for mood, cognition, body composition, and general wellness remain less certain.

What Are Subcutaneous Testosterone Injections?

A subcutaneous testosterone injection, often shortened to SubQ testosterone, places medication into the fatty tissue immediately underneath the skin.

This is different from an intramuscular injection, which travels deeper into skeletal muscle.

With testosterone cypionate, the medication is suspended in an oil-based solution. After injection beneath the skin, it forms a small depot from which testosterone is gradually absorbed.

For women, the goal is generally not to reach the testosterone concentrations used for male hormone replacement. Instead, when testosterone is clinically appropriate, treatment is intended to maintain exposure within a normal female physiologic range.

This makes careful dosing especially important.

Why Some Women May Prefer SubQ Testosterone

Subcutaneous testosterone injections may offer several practical advantages when prescribed and monitored appropriately.

Potential benefits of the delivery method can include:

• Smaller needles than many traditional intramuscular injections
• Avoidance of deep muscle injections
• Small, adjustable doses
• Convenient administration schedules
• No testosterone gel left on the skin
• No risk of transferring topical testosterone to a partner or child
• Easier adjustment than a fixed implanted pellet
• Potentially simpler self-administration after appropriate instruction

Hone Health describes low-dose subcutaneous testosterone cypionate as one approach used in women’s hormone care, while emphasizing the importance of individualized medical evaluation and monitoring (Hone Health, 2026).

However, the distinction between convenience and proven effectiveness is important.

The clinical whitepaper notes that randomized evidence for women is overwhelmingly based on transdermal testosterone. Subcutaneous injections have not been studied through the same depth of dedicated efficacy trials in women.

For this reason, SubQ testosterone should not be presented as universally superior to transdermal treatment.

SubQ Testosterone Versus Intramuscular Testosterone

Intramuscular testosterone is placed directly into a muscle, while SubQ testosterone is deposited into fatty tissue.

Both routes can deliver testosterone systemically, but they require different injection techniques.

FOLX Health notes practical differences in needle size, injection depth, and administration sites between intramuscular and subcutaneous hormone injections (FOLX Health, n.d.).

Women require particular attention because testosterone doses used for female physiologic replacement can be much smaller than doses traditionally used in men.

The Worldborne Medical review emphasizes that no scientifically established milligram-for-milligram conversion exists between the well-studied female transdermal regimens and a SubQ injection. The document therefore emphasizes monitoring actual serum exposure rather than assuming a particular injectable dose matches a patch or cream.

The Goal Is Balance, Not More Testosterone

Hormone optimization should never become a race toward a higher laboratory number.

For women, more testosterone does not necessarily mean more benefit.

Professional guidance recommends keeping testosterone concentrations within the physiologic premenopausal female range rather than creating supraphysiologic exposure (Davis et al., 2019; Parish et al., 2021).

A testosterone laboratory result also should not be used alone to diagnose why a woman feels tired, has reduced sexual desire, has difficulty exercising, or notices body-composition changes.

A complete evaluation may need to consider:

• Menopause and perimenopause
• Thyroid function
• Estrogen status
• Medications
• Sleep quality
• Depression or anxiety
• Relationship factors
• Vaginal pain or dryness
• Nutrition
• Insulin resistance
• Physical inactivity
• Chronic pain
• Previous injuries
• Other medical conditions

The Wellness Doctor RX model emphasizes this broader functional and integrative approach rather than treating a laboratory number in isolation. Its current content combines functional medicine, hormone-related education, nutrition, chiropractic care, and rehabilitation within a whole-person clinical framework.

What Benefits of Testosterone Are Supported?

The most established benefit involves sexual function in appropriately selected postmenopausal women with HSDD.

Research has found improvements in areas such as:

• Sexual desire
• Arousal
• Sexual satisfaction
• Orgasm
• Pleasure
• Reduced sexual distress

(Davis et al., 2019).

Testosterone also interacts biologically with muscle and bone. This relationship is particularly interesting in an integrative wellness environment.

However, clinical studies have not established testosterone therapy as a stand-alone treatment for building muscle, losing body fat, treating depression, preventing osteoporosis, or improving cognition in healthy women.

This is why testosterone should be one part of a carefully selected medical plan rather than viewed as a universal anti-aging treatment.

Testosterone, Muscle Strength, and Women’s Physical Health

Muscle becomes increasingly important as women age.

Maintaining skeletal muscle supports:

• Strength
• Balance
• Joint stability
• Glucose metabolism
• Mobility
• Bone loading
• Fall prevention
• Physical independence
• Healthy aging

Testosterone receptors are present in muscle tissue, so testosterone has a physiologic connection with skeletal muscle. Still, hormone therapy cannot replace the things muscles actually need to become stronger.

Those include resistance exercise, adequate protein, appropriate calories, recovery, sleep, good biomechanics, and progressive rehabilitation.

This is where the Wellness Doctor RX approach connects hormone medicine with physical and musculoskeletal care.

How Chiropractic Care Fits Into Women’s Hormone Wellness

Chiropractic treatment does not replace testosterone therapy, and chiropractic adjustments should not be promoted as a direct way to increase testosterone levels.

Instead, chiropractic and rehabilitation address another important part of the wellness equation: how the body moves and functions.

A woman experiencing hormonal changes may also have:

• Reduced muscle strength
• Previous back or neck injuries
• Hip weakness
• Poor posture
• Reduced spinal mobility
• Joint restrictions
• Core weakness
• Deconditioning
• Pain that limits exercise

These problems can make it difficult to participate in the very resistance training and physical activity needed for long-term musculoskeletal health.

An integrative plan may therefore include:

• Chiropractic assessment
• Corrective exercise
• Progressive resistance training
• Core stabilization
• Mobility work
• Neuromuscular rehabilitation
• Functional movement training
• Nutrition counseling
• Protein optimization
• Metabolic assessment
• Hormone evaluation when medically appropriate

WellnessDoctorRX.com currently describes its clinical model as combining chiropractic, functional medicine, nutrition, injury rehabilitation, and other individualized health strategies.

The goal is not simply to “balance hormones.” It is to help the entire person function better.

Connecting Biochemistry With Biomechanics

A useful way to understand integrative care is to separate two related areas.

Biochemistry includes hormones, nutrition, glucose regulation, inflammation, micronutrients, and metabolism.

Biomechanics includes muscles, joints, posture, movement, strength, stability, and coordination.

A patient can have normal hormone levels and still experience pain because of poor movement mechanics. Likewise, treating spinal or muscular dysfunction does not automatically correct an underlying hormonal problem.

Integrative care brings these areas together rather than forcing one therapy to solve every problem.

That philosophy closely matches the Wellness Doctor RX focus on whole-person functional medicine and chiropractic rehabilitation.

The Medical and Chiropractic Team in El Paso

Dr. Alexander Jimenez, DC, APRN, FNP-BC, CFMP, IFMCP, ATN, CCST, serves as Clinical Director and combines his background in chiropractic care, advanced practice nursing, functional medicine, rehabilitation, and musculoskeletal medicine within an integrative model.

Wellness Doctor RX also identifies Dr. Maria Cardenas, MD, as a board-certified internal medicine physician, Medical Director, Clinical Director, and Collaborative Physician.

This multidisciplinary structure allows the team to evaluate medical and musculoskeletal concerns from different professional perspectives.

The team can integrate areas such as:

• Women’s wellness
• Functional medicine
• Medical evaluation
• Chiropractic treatment
• Musculoskeletal rehabilitation
• Hormone-related care
• Nutrition
• Metabolic health
• Personal injury care
• Exercise progression
• Chronic pain management

This is especially useful when a woman’s symptoms cross several systems rather than fitting neatly into one diagnosis.

Monitoring Testosterone Therapy

Testosterone therapy requires ongoing monitoring.

Before treatment, clinicians may assess testosterone and other appropriate laboratory markers while reviewing symptoms, medications, medical history, and treatment goals.

Once therapy begins, testosterone levels can help determine whether exposure remains in the female physiologic range.

Patients should also be monitored for possible androgen-related effects such as:

• Acne
• Increased facial or body hair
• Scalp hair thinning
• Voice changes
• Changes in menstrual patterns
• Other signs of excessive androgen exposure

The whitepaper recommends reassessment after treatment begins and emphasizes stopping or reconsidering treatment when meaningful benefit does not occur rather than continuing to increase the dose beyond the physiologic range.

Long-term cardiovascular and breast safety also remains incompletely established, which makes individualized risk assessment and shared decision-making important.

A Whole-Person Wellness Strategy

Subcutaneous testosterone therapy can be one medical option for carefully selected women, but successful wellness care involves more than one hormone.

At Wellness Doctor RX, an integrative strategy may connect hormone evaluation with nutrition, metabolism, chiropractic care, exercise, rehabilitation, sleep, stress management, and functional medicine.

That approach recognizes an important principle:

Hormones influence the body, but muscles still need training, joints need to move properly, nutrition must support recovery, and underlying health problems must be identified.

For women considering testosterone treatment, the most responsible approach is individualized medical evaluation, realistic expectations, physiologic dosing, laboratory monitoring, and a broader health plan designed around the person’s actual needs.

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References

Davis, S. R., Baber, R., Panay, N., et al. (2019). Global consensus position statement on the use of testosterone therapy for women. Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, 104(10), 4660-4666.

Davison, S. L., Bell, R., Donath, S., Montalto, J. G., & Davis, S. R. (2005). Androgen levels in adult females: Changes with age, menopause, and oophorectomy. Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, 90(7), 3847-3853.

DeRosa, A. (2025). Testosterone therapy in women: Breaking myths and gaps. Medical Research Archives.

FOLX Health. (n.d.). HRT subcutaneous and intramuscular injections.

Hatzilabrou, T. A. (n.d.). Testosterone therapy in women. Worldborne Medical Clinical Frontiers: Androgen Series.

Highland Longevity. (n.d.). Women’s testosterone dosing guide.

Hone Health. (2026). Testosterone injections for women.

Hone Health. (2026). Testosterone cypionate injection for women: Risks and benefits.

Parish, S. J., Simon, J. A., Davis, S. R., et al. (2021). International Society for the Study of Women’s Sexual Health clinical practice guideline for the use of systemic testosterone for hypoactive sexual desire disorder in women. Journal of Sexual Medicine, 18(5), 849-867.

Wellness Doctor RX. (2026). El Paso wellness and functional medicine.

Wellness Doctor RX. (2026). Women’s hormonal health: Understanding testosterone deficiency.