Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s (D-N.Y.) speech Tuesday night at the Democratic National Convention “brought into sharp relief the passion for women’s issues her campaign engendered — and the possibility of a legacy that could re-energize or divide the feminist movement” — the Boston Globe reports. According to the Globe, it is not clear whether a new movement would benefit the organizations that have long been at the forefront of women’s issues, such as EMILY’s List and NARAL Pro-Choice America.

Such groups now are calling for unity, saying that some of the most important women’s issues, especially abortion rights, are at stake in the November election and that Clinton supporters should stand up for them, the Globe reports. Many Clinton supporters, however, still are angry with Democratic leaders and women’s groups, saying they “did little to confront rampant sexism and allowed an unfair primary process,” according to the Globe. Consequently, some groups are divided over supporting Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) or Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) — “a troubling turn for the Democratic Party and for the feminist establishment, whose credibility depends on keeping Clinton supporters in the fold,” according to the Globe.

Amy Siskind — who helped start The New Agenda, a nonpartisan group focused on women’s issues and electing female candidates — said that the group believes in abortion rights but does not make them a platform issue. “We believe that once women in this country have power in government and the workplace and money, things like abortion will not even be on the table for discussion,” Siskind said.

Gloria Allred, a women’s rights lawyer from Los Angeles and a Clinton delegate, said women who supported Clinton should vote for Obama at the very least because of abortion rights. Obama supports abortion rights, and McCain favors overturning Roe v. Wade and working to eventually outlaw abortions.

“We have to educate these women who are disappointed Hillary didn’t win,” Allred said, adding, “We have to help them to understand what’s at stake. We can’t have McCain appointing two Supreme Court vacancies” (Wangsness, Boston Globe, 8/27).

Reprinted with kind permission from http://www.nationalpartnership.org. You can view the entire Daily Women’s Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery here. The Daily Women’s Health Policy Report is a free service of the National Partnership for Women & Families, published by The Advisory Board Company.

© 2008 The Advisory Board Company. All rights reserved.

Although many women quit smoking during pregnancy to protect their unborn children from the effects of cigarettes, half of them resume the habit within a few months of giving birth.

By shedding light on the factors that enable the other half to put down that cigarette for good, a study by researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill could lead to programs designed to help women quit and stay quit.

According to the study, women with a live-in partner who shared some of the burden of child-rearing were more likely to remain smoke free, while women who were single mothers or who lacked the social and financial resources to deal with being a new parent were more likely to relapse.

“In the future we can look at these and other factors in women who quit smoking during pregnancy to assess who is at low or high risk of relapse,” said Carol E. Ripley-Moffitt, MDiv, research associate in UNC’s department of family medicine and the study’s lead author. “We can then offer more intensive interventions for those at higher risk to address the physical, behavioral and social issues related to relapse.”

Smoking during pregnancy increases the risks of pregnancy complications, decreased birth weight and SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome), Ripley-Moffitt said. She noted that the past 15 years have seen a steady decrease in the number of women who smoke while pregnant, in part because of an overall decline in smoking rates among all women of childbearing age and in part because of interventions targeting women during the prenatal period.

“But more needs to be done because over 50 percent of women who quit the habit during pregnancy are smoking again at six months postpartum,” Ripley-Moffitt said.

The UNC study, which appears in the August issue of the journal Nicotine and Tobacco Research, is the first to examine not only the factors leading to relapse but also those leading to a smoke-free life after pregnancy. Ripley-Moffitt and colleagues interviewed pregnant women attending prenatal clinics in central North Carolina who had quit smoking before 30 weeks gestation. Of the 94 women enrolled in the study, 43 had remained smoke-free and 51 had relapsed when interviewed at 4 months postpartum.

Researchers asked all women about their decision to quit during pregnancy, how they quit, and what they would do in the future.

Women who had remained smoke-free were asked about the benefits they had experienced, how they would handle temptations to smoke, how they had rewarded themselves for not smoking, and what support they might need to remain smoke-free.

Women who had relapsed were asked to describe specific situations that caused them to return to smoking, their feelings about smoking again, perceptions about the dangers of secondhand smoke, and what would need to be different in their lives in order to stop smoking again.

Several factors emerged to differentiate the two groups of women. Those who remained smoke-free postpartum were bolstered by strong social support, strong internal belief systems, strong beliefs in postpartum health benefits of not smoking, negative experiences with a return to smoking and concrete strategies for dealing with temptations.

Women who relapsed postpartum were undermined by easy access to cigarettes, reliance on cigarettes to deal with stress, lack of financial resources, lack of resources for childrearing and low self-esteem.

The findings may enable researchers and clinicians to distinguish between pregnant women who will ultimately relapse from those that remain smoke free postpartum, Ripley-Moffitt said. The findings also suggest that any new programs aimed at improving quit rates must be comprehensive in nature - they must give women the tools to acquire new skills, deal with addiction and improve life circumstances, socially and financially.

“Many of the women who relapsed were already trying to quit again when we interviewed them,” Ripley-Moffitt said. “While there is no simple solution, we recommend directly addressing the social and financial stresses that lead to relapse. We hope that our study will encourage creative interventions to help mothers sustain a smoke-free lifestyle after pregnancy, improving overall health for women and their families.”

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This research was supported by a grant from the Smoke-Free Families Program of The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. UNC Study co-authors include Dr. Adam O. Goldstein, professor of family medicine and Dr. Jacob A. Lohr, professor of pediatrics. Lohr is also affiliated with the Governor’s Institute on Alcohol and Substance Abuse, which collaborated on the study.

Source: Stephanie Crayton
University of North Carolina School of Medicine

Lymphangioleiomyomatosis, or LAM, is a rare but serious lung disease that may cause severe respiratory symptoms in patients. The often-fatal disease has no cure.

Researchers say the key to learning more about LAM might lie in better understanding how symptoms differ among LAM patients

University of Cincinnati (UC) scientists are conducting a new research study that examines why symptoms of LAM are different in certain subgroups of people with the goal of finding more successful therapies.

LAM occurs when an unusual type of cell begins to grow out of control and spread to restricted areas in the body, including the lungs, kidneys, lymph nodes and vessels.

A team led by Jean Elwing, MD, an assistant professor in UC’s pulmonary, critical care and sleep division, is enrolling female LAM patients to see if pulmonary hypertension and pulmonary vascular disease may be contributing to their respiratory symptoms.

Pulmonary hypertension is a blood vessel disorder of the lungs in which pressure in the pulmonary artery, the blood vessel that leads from the heart to the lungs, rises above normal levels.

“We plan to evaluate a group of women with LAM who are experiencing shortness of breath for the presence of pulmonary hypertension,” she says. “We will look at participant’s medical history, pulmonary function tests, exercise tolerance, echocardiogram results and previous biopsy samples.

“We are hopeful this information will increase our understanding of how LAM can manifest in the patients it affects. In the future, this information may be useful in developing better management strategies for this disease.”

Elwing says this study will compare LAM patients who also have pulmonary hypertension with those who do not to differentiate between the groups.

“Some participants will be seen once in clinic and undergo testing with an echocardiogram while participating in this study,” she says. “The individuals who have already undergone a clinical pulmonary hypertension evaluation may be able to participate through a review of select medical records and lung biopsy specimens.”

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This study is investigator-initiated and is funded by a Rhen Family Grant from the University of Cincinnati.

Source: Katie Pence
http://www.uc.edu/news

Breastfeeding for at least six months might lower the risk of developing so-called “triple negative” breast cancer, an aggressive form of the disease that is more common in black and younger women, according to a study published on Monday in the journal Cancer, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports (Paulson, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 8/24).

Nearly 50% of black women younger than age 55 who are diagnosed with breast cancer have the triple negative type, compared with 22% of white women. The five-year survival rate for triple negative breast cancer is 15% lower than for other types of the disease, in part because the disease responds poorly to most breast cancer treatments (Kaiser Health Disparities Report, 5/30).

To determine what puts women at risk for the triple negative type of breast cancer, lead researcher Amanda Phipps, a scientist in the public health division of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, and colleagues studied two groups of women ages 55 to 79. One group was made up of 1,140 women who had several different forms of breast cancer, including the triple negative type, the most common “luminal” form and another form associated with the HER2 protein. The second group was made up of 1,476 women who had not been diagnosed with breast cancer.

Researchers took into account the participants’ reproductive health histories, which would provide indicators of hormone levels over time, such as breastfeeding practices and the onset of menstruation and menopause.

Among other findings, researchers found that breastfeeding for at least six months corresponded with a lower risk of developing the triple-negative form of breast cancer and the common luminal form. It is not exactly clear why breastfeeding influenced hormonal cancer risks. Phipps said, “One possible explanation is that while women are breastfeeding, they aren’t menstruating and so their hormones aren’t cycling,” so the longer women breastfeed, the less chance their hormones have to develop a cancer. Another theory is that breastfeeding alters the structure of breast cells in a way that makes them less prone to develop into cancer cells, Phipps said.

She said the findings indicate that reproductive behavior “helps explain why some women are at higher risk and also why certain therapies are not effective against these more aggressive forms of breast cancer” (Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 8/24).

An abstract of the study is available online.

Reprinted with kind permission from http://www.kaisernetwork.org. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery at http://www.kaisernetwork.org/dailyreports/healthpolicy. The Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report is published for kaisernetwork.org, a free service of The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation.

© 2008 Advisory Board Company and Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.

Yale University researchers reported Tuesday they have found a molecular mechanism by which estrogen improves memory, a finding that may aid the quest to improve cognition in aging women without the negative health effects of hormone therapy.

The issue of whether estrogen improves memory in women is still hotly debated. Recent studies have shown little or no benefit of hormone therapy in preventing memory loss or dementia among post-menopausal women. Yet many lab studies have shown the benefits of estrogen on memory and brain function in both animals and humans.

“No study has been able to directly link changes in the brain with changes in memory, so our study helps to fill in this gap,” said Karyn Frick, associate professor of psychology and senior author of the study.

The study, published in the Journal of Neuroscience, pinpoints a mechanism in the brain by which estrogen enhances memory in mice. If results hold in people, it could lead to therapies that could benefit memory in menopausal women, and possibly even men.Frick’s team conducted a series of experiments that involved the hippocampus, a part of the brain critical for learning and memory. In one, they injected mice lacking ovaries with either a control substance or with estradiol, a potent form of estrogen, immediately after training in a memory task. Mice that received estradiol remembered better than mice that received the control injection, suggesting that estradiol plays an important role in memory consolidation.

Importantly, the investigators also showed that estradiol activates a specific molecule in the hippocampus, and drugs that blocked this molecule in the hippocampus completely prevented estradiol from enhancing memory. This novel finding pinpoints this molecule as a crucial step for estradiol to influence memory.

“Although the findings do not change overall debate on the use of estrogen therapy to reduce age-related cognitive decline, our study illustrates that specific molecules may be identified that are critical to estrogen’s ability to modulate memory,” Frick said. “Therefore, it may be possible to design drugs to target these molecules and directly affect memory. And since such drugs would not be hormones, they could produce the beneficial effects of estrogen treatment without the side effects of current hormone therapy.”

The National Institute on Aging funded study

Other authors include Stephanie M. Fernandez, Michael C. Lewis, Angela S. Pechenino, Lauren L. Harburger, Patrick T. Orr, Jodi E. Gresack, and Glenn E. Schafe

Citation: Neuroscience, Aug. 27, 2008
Karyn M. Frick
http://www.yale.edu/psychology/FacInfo/Frick.html

http://www.yale.edu

View drug information on Estradiol.

The Michigan Board of State Canvassers on Thursday certified a ballot measure that would loosen Michigan’s restrictions on human embryonic stem cell research, the Detroit Free Press reports (Bell, Detroit Free Press, 8/22). The board found the group Cure Michigan submitted nearly 500,000 signatures backing the proposal, which were 100,000 more than the required minimum to place a proposal on the ballot in the state (Heinlein, Detroit News, 8/22).

The official wording of the ballot measure says that it will expand use of human embryos for any research permitted under federal law subject to the following limits: the embryos are created for fertility treatment purposes; are not suitable for implantation or are in excess of clinical needs; would be discarded unless used for research; were donated by the person seeking fertility treatment; provide that stem cells cannot be taken from human embryos more than 14 days after cell division begins; prohibit any person from selling or purchasing human embryos for stem cell research; and prohibit state and local laws that prevent, restrict or discourage stem cell research, future therapies and cures (AP/MLive.com, 8/21).

Joe Schwarz — a physician and former Republican member of Congress who heads the Cure Michigan campaign — said, “What we are talking about here is providing cures for people, providing therapies for people. In this century, a majority of therapies and cures will be from genetic therapy and cellular therapy and not from popping chemical compounds, which is what we’ve done all our lives. So this is a movement forward” (Martin, AP/MLive.com, 8/21). Critics of the proposal have opposed it on religious and moral grounds. David Doyle, a spokesperson for Michigan Citizens Against Unrestricted Science and Experimentation, said the initiative would undo a 1978 law banning the destruction of human embryos and leave in question a 1998 law prohibiting human cloning. “It goes too far, has too many loopholes and would allow unlimited experimentation on human embryos,” Doyle said (Detroit News, 8/22).

According to the Detroit News, proponents and opponents of the measure are expected to spend a combined $20 million or more on their campaigns (Detroit News, 8/22).

Reprinted with kind permission from http://www.nationalpartnership.org. You can view the entire Daily Women’s Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery here. The Daily Women’s Health Policy Report is a free service of the National Partnership for Women & Families, published by The Advisory Board Company.

© 2008 The Advisory Board Company. All rights reserved.

A proposed HHS rule that Secretary Mike Leavitt says aims to protect health workers who refuse to participate in abortions based on religious beliefs will be published in the Federal Register Aug. 26 and could go into effect after a 30-day public comment period, BNA reports. Leavitt removed from the rule a section that would have required a broader definition of the term “abortion” by referring to the procedure as “anything that affects a fertilized egg.” However, the regulation still includes a requirement for all recipients of federal funding to certify that they will not fire or refuse to hire employees who have “a religious objection to any health service, no matter how central to the job or health of the woman” (BNA, 8/25). Both critics and supporters of the rule say it is written broadly enough to protect health workers who refuse to dispense birth control pills, emergency contraception and other forms of contraception (Daily Women’s Health Policy Report, 8/22).

According to BNA, the provision could come into conflict with a recently revised section in the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s compliance manual, which states that if there is not a qualified pharmacist present who is willing to dispense contraceptives, it may be an undue hardship for the business to accommodate a refusing pharmacist.

BNA reports that disputes over the religious rights of employees have arisen in state legislatures, pharmacy boards and courts. Four states expressly have allowed pharmacists to refuse to dispense contraceptives; seven have required them to dispense lawfully prescribed medication; and, according to data from the National Women’s Law Center, pharmacists are suing their employers for religious discrimination in the workplace. Leavitt, who drafted the regulation in July for informal review within HHS, said he had become “aware that certain medical specialty groups were adopting requirements which potentially violate a physician’s right to choose whether he or she performs an abortion.” Leavitt added that he wrote to these groups “protesting their actions” but found their response to be “dodgy and unsatisfying.” He said, “If [HHS] issues a regulation on this matter, it will aim at one thing — protecting the right of conscience of those who practice medicine.”

BNA also reports that Leavitt singled out the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology in an Aug. 21 statement, saying an ACOG ethics committee opinion from earlier this year could force physicians to refer patients for abortions or “risk losing their board certification.” According to BNA, both groups have denied that the ethics opinion affects physician certification by the Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology or membership in ACOG.

Although Leavitt abandoned the broader definition of abortion, BNA reports that thousands of opponents objected to the rest of the regulation, which would allow all health care providers refusal rights and could restrict patient access to lawful and needed health care services. Jerry Brown (D), California’s attorney general, said the proposed regulation also would limit the state’s ability to enforce a California law requiring employer health coverage for contraception. Jill Morrison, senior counsel of NWLC, said that a possible result of refusal rights is that a group of people might try to be hired at a family planning facility “with the specific objective of obstructing justice,” adding, “If that took place, there wouldn’t be anything you could do about it.” Gretchen Borchelt, another senior counsel at NWLC, said the regulation “makes it clear that its goal is to undermine state laws such as those requiring pharmacists and pharmacies to dispense emergency contraception to rape survivors, and health insurance plans to cover contraception.”

However, BNA reports that other organizations support the proposed regulation. John Brehany, executive director of the Catholic Medical Association, said that the group “is very supportive of Secretary Leavitt and the need for the new regulation,” adding, “Our members think the laws on the books are not comprehensive and not consistent from state to state” since health care providers may face employment discrimination, lose their licenses or be forced to violate their consciences.

Gene Kapp, spokesperson for the American Center for Law and Justice, said the organization has not been tracking the regulation so far. However, once it is added to the Federal Register, “we would quite likely be engaged in the issue,” Kapp said (BNA, 8/25).

Editorial

According to a Seattle Times editorial, the regulation “is unnecessary and misses a critical element: respect for abortion rights.” Although Leavitt removed the expanded definition of abortion from the regulation, the “White House’s assault on women’s health care rights remains,” according to the Times. The editorial says that the “broad wording in the rule changes can be interpreted to extend to oral contraceptives and emergency contraception” and that “[s]uch a broad interpretation would jeopardize funding for Medicaid and Title X.” The editorial adds that “[p]ressure should be brought to bear” on Leavitt, adding that the “proposed changes must include explicit assurances they will not be used to block access to birth control and family planning.” The editorial concludes that “[o]therwise, there is no choice but to see the rules as an attack on women’s reproductive health rights” (Seattle Times, 8/25).

Reprinted with kind permission from http://www.nationalpartnership.org. You can view the entire Daily Women’s Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery here. The Daily Women’s Health Policy Report is a free service of the National Partnership for Women & Families, published by The Advisory Board Company.

© 2008 The Advisory Board Company. All rights reserved.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases of the National Institutes of Health has awarded a $2 million grant to Moffitt Cancer Center to study the influences of physician, patient and policy factors on recommendations of HPV vaccination in the years following licensure of the vaccine.

Principal investigator Susan Vadaparampil , Ph.D., M.P.H., will focus on physician recommendations of GARDASIL, an HPV vaccine approved by the Food and Drug Administration for use in females ages 9 to 26. GARDASIL protects against HPV types 16 and 18, which cause approximately 70 percent of cervical cancers, as well as HPV types 6 and 11, which cause approximately 90 percent of genital warts.

Researchers say it is crucial that physicians recommend and advocate for HPV vaccination, but current rates of immunization for children and adults in the United States are sub par.

Vadaparampil and her team will survey 1,000 physicians in pediatrics, obstetrics/gynecology, and family and internal medicine three years and five years after the vaccine was licensed by the FDA. The goal is to determine how often physicians are recommending the vaccine, as well as what other factors may contribute to vaccine recommendations.

The $2,079,548 grant will fund Vadaparampil’s study, “Recommendation of HPV Vaccination Among U.S. Physicians,” which will conclude June 30, 2012.Vadaparampil will lead a team including co-investigators Anna Giuliano , Ph.D.; Ji-Hyun Lee , Ph.D.; and Gwendolyn Quinn , Ph.D. Co-investigators also include Dr. Richard Roetzheim and Dr. Karen Bruder from USF Health; Dr. Neal Halsey from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health ; and Dr. Jessica Kahn from Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center.

About H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute

Located in Tampa, Florida, Moffitt Cancer Center is the only Florida-based cancer center with the NCI designation as a Comprehensive Cancer Center for its excellence in research and contributions to clinical trials, prevention and cancer control. Moffitt currently has 15 affiliates in Florida, one in Georgia and two in Puerto Rico. Additionally, Moffitt is a member of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network, a prestigious alliance of the country’s leading cancer centers, and is listed in U.S. News & World Report as one of “America’s Best Hospitals” for cancer. Moffitt’s sole mission is to contribute to the prevention and cure of cancer.

H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute

View drug information on Gardasil.

Women may safely discontinue oral anticoagulants (blood thinners) after 6 months of treatment following a first unprovoked venous blood clot (thromboembolism) if they have no or one risk factor, concludes a study of 646 participants in a multicentre prospective cohort study.

Blood clots are common and a potentially fatal condition. For patients with spontaneous blood clots who stop anticoagulation therapy, the risk of a recurrence in the first year is 5% to 27%, yet there is a risk of major bleeding and fatal hemorrhage while continuing anticoagulants.

“It may be safe for women who have taken oral anticoagulants for 5-7 months after an unprovoked venous thromboembolism to discontinue therapy if they have 0 or 1 of the following: 1) hyperpigmentation (brown discoloration), edema (swelling) or redness of either leg; 2) a D-dimer level (blood clotting test) of 250ug/L or more while taking warfarin, 3) BMI [body mass index] 30kg/m2; and aged 65 years or more,” conclude Dr. Marc Rodger and coauthors.

The authors caution that “it appears all men are at high risk of recurrence” and further investigation into risk determination needs to be pursued.

In an accompanying commentary, Dr. Clive Kearon states that patient preference for the duration of anticoagulant therapy must be considered in deciding whether to continue or discontinue therapy.

About CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal)

CMAJ is the leading health sciences journal in Canada. CMAJ is a general medical journal publishing original research and review articles, commentaries and editorials, practice updates, an arts and ideas section and health news. Published continuously since 1911, new issues are uploaded on http://www.cmaj.ca every second Monday at 4:30 p.m. EST/EDT. http://www.cmaj.ca contains the complete editorial contents of CMAJ, supplemented by a variety of interactive features and additional content.

Canadian Medical Association Journal

View drug information on Warfarin Sodium tablets.

A new study published on bmj.comargues that for older women, health related quality of lifecan be improved by hormone replacementtherapy (HRT). The authors recommend that HRT guidelines should berevised with this most current evidence taken into consideration.

Earlier studies have shown that HRT has the potential for generalimprovements in quality of life measures - how patients feel orfunction. The therapy has also been successful in reducing the numberand severityof symptoms related to menopause. However, a weakness in these studiesis that the researchers have used general measures rather than moresensitive condition specific ones.

To add to the body of research dealing with health related quality oflife, ProfessorAlastair MacLennan and colleagues study outcomes of participants in theWISDOM trial - a 10-year study beginning in 1999 that focuses onlong-term benefits and risks of HRT in postmenopausal women. The WISDOMtrial sample consisted of 5,692 healthywomen between the ages of 50 and 69 from the UK, Australia, and NewZealand who were randomly assigned to receive either combined HRT(estrogen and progestogen) orplacebo. On average, women were followed-up for about 12 months soresearchers could test clinical outcomes such as cardiovasculardisease, fractures, and breast cancer. In addition, the women provideddetailed information on how HRT impacted their quality of life.

The quality of life measurement was derived from questionnaireresponses targeted towards physical and emotional components of health(depressed mood, memory, and concentration), sleep problems, and sexualfunctioning. Also included was a symptoms questionnaire.

MacLennan and colleagues found that after one year, women in thecombined HRT group saw significant improvements in sexualfunctioning, sleep problems and vasomotor symptoms (hot flushes andsweats) compared to women in the placebo group. More specifically,women in the HRT group reported:

• Fewer hot flushes (9% v 25%),
• Fewer nightsweats (14% v 23%),
• Less aching joints and muscles (57% v 63%),
• Less insomnia(35% v 41%),
• Less vaginal dryness (14% v 19%),
• More breast tenderness (16% v 7%), and
• More vaginal discharge(14% v 5%).

There were no significant differences between other menopausalsymptoms, depression, and overall quality of life between the twogroups.

Although theseresults are similar to the findings of the Women’s HealthInitiative (WHI) - HRT use reduced hot flushes and night sweats,improved sleep, and eased bodilypain, the WISDOM trial was in fact halted early since the WHI foundthat elderly women taking HRT had more heart attacks than non-HRTusers. These leads the researchers to caution that health relatedquality of life should be weighed against the risk of increased cardiacevents, venousthromboembolism and breast cancer that are associated with HRT.

Health related quality of life after combined hormonereplacement therapy: randomised controlled trial
AmandaJ Welton, Madge R Vickers, Joseph Kim, Deborah Ford, Beverley A Lawton,Alastair H MacLennan, Sarah K Meredith, Jeannett Martin, Tom WMeade for the WISDOM team
BMJ (2008). 337: a1190.
doi:10.1136/bmj.a1190
ClickHere to View Journal Web Site

Written by: Peter M Crosta
Copyright: Medical News Today