Tampa Bay APRN lays out six questions to ask before hormone therapy

Maribel Dixon of South Beach Wellness Center in Lutz says patients should verify training, monitoring plans and credentials before starting hormone replacement therapy. Her six-question framework is meant to help patients compare providers and understand how hormone care is selected and tracked.

Why it matters: - Patients starting hormone replacement therapy often focus on symptoms and benefits first, but Dixon says training, monitoring and credential checks can affect safety and treatment quality. - Dixon’s message targets a common gap in hormone care: patients may not know why a treatment was chosen, what follow-up is planned, or how to confirm a provider’s qualifications.

What happened: - Maribel Dixon, MSN, APRN, FNP-C, founder of South Beach Wellness Center in Lutz, published six questions she says patients should ask before starting HRT. - The questions are meant to help patients evaluate a hormone provider’s education, clinical reasoning, treatment options and monitoring plan. - Dixon is a board-certified Family Nurse Practitioner and says her hormone training includes WorldLink Medical’s Advanced BHRT certification pathway and EvexiPEL certification.

The details: - Dixon says Florida does not require a separate BHRT, menopause or hormone-therapy credential for otherwise qualified prescribers working within their lawful scope. - Dixon says there is no separate hormone-therapy license that proves a clinician completed advanced HRT training before prescribing hormones. - The first question asks what hormone-specific education the provider has completed and where that training came from. - Dixon says patients should ask how a provider decides whether hormone therapy is appropriate, rather than assuming every symptom needs a prescription. - She points to fatigue, sleep disruption, decreased libido, mood changes, difficulty concentrating and weight changes as symptoms that can have multiple causes. - The third question asks what will be monitored after treatment begins, including follow-up, adverse effects, testing and reassessment. - Dixon says monitoring should not be reduced to chasing a predetermined laboratory number. - The fourth question asks what treatment options are available and why one is being recommended over another. - Dixon says hormone therapy can be delivered through different formulations and routes depending on the hormone and the patient’s clinical situation. - The fifth question asks how hormone therapy fits into a patient’s broader medical picture, including medications, risk factors and other conditions. - Dixon says patients who receive hormone treatment outside primary care should ask how information will be shared between clinicians. - The sixth question asks patients to independently verify a provider’s license and credentials. - Dixon provided her National Provider Identifier as 1851802300, listing her as a Family Nurse Practitioner in the federal NPI system.

Between the lines: - Dixon’s framework is also a positioning statement about transparency in a crowded wellness market, where “certified” can mean different things to different patients. - Her comments suggest patients should treat hormone care as a clinical decision, not a branded service, and ask how the treatment plan will change if symptoms or test results do not match expectations. - The emphasis on verification reflects a broader trust issue: patients are being urged to confirm both licensure and the meaning of any extra training before starting treatment.

What's next: - Dixon says she plans to keep using the six questions as a patient-facing checklist and expects patients to bring them into consultations. - South Beach Wellness Center will continue offering menopause and perimenopause care, hormone replacement therapy, testosterone replacement therapy, medical weight management and primary care in the Tampa Bay area. - Patients can verify licensure and review the provider’s social media profiles through the practice’s publicly listed channels, including Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and TikTok.

The bottom line: - Dixon’s core message is simple: before starting hormone therapy, patients should ask who is prescribing it, what training supports that decision, and how the treatment will be monitored.