Estrogen Matters: Why Taking Hormones in Menopause Can Improve Women's Well-Being and Lengthen Their Lives -- Without Raising the Risk of Breast Cancer (2024 Revised and Updated Edition)

by Carol Tavris

By the early 1990s, researchers had fifty years of well-documented evidence showing estrogen’s benefits. Estrogen not only successfully controlled menopausal symptoms in most women but also significantly reduced the risks of heart disease, hip fractures, colon cancer, and Alzheimer’s. A 1991 New England Journal of Medicine editorial titled “Uncertainty about Postmenopausal Estrogen: Time for Action, Not Debate” reported a 40 to 50 percent reduction in atherosclerotic heart disease, which is responsible for the deaths of more than seven times as many American women as breast cancer.1 The long-running Framingham study reported a 50 percent drop in osteoporosis-associated hip fractures, which were linked to as many deaths every year as breast cancer. Two studies, one from the University of Wisconsin and one from the American Cancer Society, reported a 50 percent decrease in the risk of developing or dying of colon cancer. Among women with no history of breast cancer, estrogen did not increase the risk of developing it, even for women who took estrogen for 10 to 15 years. Most notably, women taking estrogen lived longer than women who did not take hormones. In 1997, three researchers reviewed the benefits of HRT for women after menopause and concluded that by reducing the risks of serious diseases, “HRT should increase life expectancy for nearly all postmenopausal women by up to 3 years.”2