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More news on the hormone therapy horizon. Not only has HRT been shown to increase breast cancer risk and death from lung cancer,
but now researchers are reporting that it also increases the risk of
ovarian cancer. Wow – three’s a charm, eh? And yet, many in the medical
community continues to support its use in perimenopausal and menopausal
women.
In this latest study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, researchers
evaluate data from 909,946 Danish women between the ages of 50 and 79
who had not previously developed hormone sensitive cancer or had had
hysterectomies.
Compared to women who never took hormones, current hormonal therapy
users had 1.38 greater incidence of all types of ovarian cancers and
and 1.44 greater incidence of cancer affecting the surface of the
ovaries (i.e. epithelial ovarian cancers) regardless of type of hormone
therapy, administration or duration of use. Notably, risk declined with
years since stopping hormone therapy.
Ovarian cancer accounts for about 4% of all cancers in women in the
US. Yet, it is one of the most lethal types and often symptomless in
the early stages. Roughly half of the women it affects die within five
years. In this study, hormone therapy increased the risk for developing
ovarian cancer by 38%.
Like any, this study had limitations that might have affected the
results, such as not adjusting for age during menopause, or use of
birth control pills (which have been shown to reduce ovarian cancer
risk). Still, it is one of the largest studies to date examining this
issue and the results do not fare well for use of hormones during
menopause.
If I seem a bit angry about this; I am. Repeatedly, data show that
hormone replacement, albeit an effective solution for declining
hormones and their effects, is dangerous. I wonder how many women need
to get sick or die before someone takes notice and removes hormones
from the market.
[Crossposted on flashfree.wordpress.com]
