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

The WISDOM study, an acronym for the Women’s International Study of Long-Duration Oestrogen After the Menopause, was a randomized, placebo-controlled trial of 3,721 postmenopausal women in Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. The women ranged in age from 50 to 69 and were randomly assigned to take HRT or placebo. Compared to the women given the placebo, women on HRT experienced improved sleep, reduced hot flushes and night sweats, fewer aching joints and muscles, less vaginal dryness, and improved sexual functioning.24 The researchers particularly emphasized the benefits of HRT on improving sleep and reducing insomnia, given that inadequate sleep is “associated with an increased risk of illnesses such as obesity, diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease. Reducing sleep deprivation might therefore have considerable health benefits.” Further, because many menopausal women report joint and muscle pain and increased arthritic symptoms—as we said, that’s another set of symptoms not popularly associated with menopause—the WISDOM researchers highlighted their finding that women reported lower levels of bodily pain after a year on HRT. Indeed, they cited the WHI, which had (quietly) gotten the same result: “A follow-up study with participants in the Women’s Health Initiative that looked at joint symptoms showed a higher prevalence of pain or stiffness in those women who stopped taking combined HRT compared with placebo.”