Here's more good news on the hormone replacement front:
Monday March 16 6:13 PM EST
Estrogen Lowers Cholesterol Levels
NEW YORK (Reuters) -- Postmenopausal women who use hormone replacement therapy lower their levels of lipoprotein(a)
-- a type of "bad" cholesterol that increases the risk of heart attack and stroke, according to the report in the journal
Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association.
"The study confirms that hormone therapy has a broad-scale and sustained impact on cholesterol metabolism," said lead author
Dr. Mark A. Espeland in a statement released by the American Heart Association. "And we found that the results were the
same, regardless of a woman's age, weight, or prior hormone use," said Espeland, a professor at the Bowman Gray School of
Medicine in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
In the study, Espeland and colleagues looked at 366 women who were participants in the Postmenopausal Estrogen/Progestin
Intervention study, which was intended to evaluate the effect of hormone therapy on risk factors for heart disease and stroke.
The women were between the ages of 45 and 65 and were each assigned to one of five groups: placebo alone; estrogen alone
(0.625 milligrams/day); estrogen (0.625 mg/day) and progestin (2.5 mg/day); estrogen (0.625 mg/day) and progestin (10
mg/day) for 12 days each month; or estrogen (0.625 mg/day) and 200 mg micronized progesterone for 12 days each month.
Most women now take progestin, a synthetic form of the hormone progesterone, in addition to estrogen to lower the risk of
uterine cancer.
The researchers report that compared with the women who took placebo, those treated in any of the other four groups had "a
17% to 23% average drop" in levels of lipoprotein(a) in their blood.
Furthermore, the researchers report, the reductions in lipoprotein(a) levels were maintained during the three years of follow-up.
There were no differences in results between the four active treatment arms, according to the article. In addition, the authors
say, effectiveness was consistent regardless of age, weight, initial blood-fat level, or use of hormones in the past. SOURCE:
Circulation (1998;97:979-986) |
