Hormone therapy in the 50s not linked to memory loss
In addition, pancreatic cancer is rare, so the risk of any woman in the study developing the condition was small. The reason for the opposite findings is not clear, the researchers said. But they speculate that the formulation and dose of estrogen in the different medications could play a role. Many birth control pills contain estrogen in combination with progestin, while estrogen-only HRT contains only estrogens.
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They were then followed for about the next 14 years. During the follow-up period, the women were asked 14 questions that measured their cognitive abilities during phone interviews. Overall, all groups scored about a 38 on a scale from zero to 50 – with lower scores signaling more memory problems. There was also no difference between the groups on several other scales that measured – among other things – attention and working memory. Francine Grodstein, who wrote an editorial accompany the new study in JAMA Internal Medicine, told Reuters Health the findings are primarily reassuring. “So for (younger) women who really need hormone therapy to treat menopause symptoms this study didn’t find hormone therapy had the amount of harm as it did for older women,” said Grodstein, an associate professor of medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. Espeland told Reuters Health there could be a few possible explanations for the difference between older and younger women using hormone replacement therapy.
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Hormone-Replacement Therapy: Could Estrogen Have Saved 50,000 Lives?
We would like to think thatphysiciansare a case apart, that we are always guided by high professional standards and meticulously reading the literature, says Katz. If that were the case, every doctor wouldve read the WHI study, every doctor wouldve read the 2011 study and we wouldnt have this problem. But actually the practice of medicine is consumed in the prevailing current in our culture. (MORE: U.S. Panel Warns Hormone-Replacement Therapy Is Too Risky ) And as is the case with any scientific finding, not everyone in the medical community is convinced that the 50,000 women would have lived had they taken estrogen therapy. But most experts agree that the results should start a serious discussion about how to communicate public-health messages so they are applied to the right populations in the correct way. What makes it a challenge is that there is not a simple set of evidence.
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A Piece of Peace 