Thursday, November 18, 2010

Breast-cancer risk of hormone therapy overblown: Gynaecologists

From the Montreal Gazette:
Women arrive at Dr. Wendy Wolfman's menopause clinic carrying shopping bags filled with herbal remedies. Most of it, she said, "is just completely a waste of money."

Some women are willing to try anything to deal with debilitating hot flashes, mood swings and other menopausal symptoms, Wolfman said.

Anything but hormones.

"They're afraid to take hormones because the publicity is they're going to get (breast) cancer," said the director of the menopause unit at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto.

Now, the Society of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists of Canada is urging Canadian women to rethink their aversion to hormone therapy. The doctors' group says that women have been needlessly frightened off a "safe and effective therapy" by reports implicating hormones in breast cancer.

In an article titled "Misinformation. Misinterpretation. Missed opportunity." posted on the gynecologists' group's website, executive vice-president Dr. Andre Lalonde says the organization has supported the breast-cancer cause "for years." ...more

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