Menopausal Hormone Therapy and Long-term Breast Cancer Risk

Reports from the Women ’s Health Initiative (WHI), first published in 2002, have informed and complicated the narrative of the relative benefits and potential harms of menopausal hormone therapy (HT) over the past 20 years. Prior to the initiation of the WHI trials, hormone therapy had already experienced a tumultuous p ublic stature. Initially heralded as the cure for menopause in the 1960s, unopposed estrogen therapy was vilified when its association with increased risk of endometrial hyperplasia and cancer emerged. The discovery that the addition of progesterone to estrogen therapy mitigated this risk propelled hormone therapy back to mainstream use by the 1990s as the primary treatment of menopausal symptoms, with the prevention and treatment of osteoporosis and improved cardiovascular health as added purported benefits.
Source: JAMA - Category: General Medicine Source Type: research