Hormone replacement therapy for postmenopausal women: Does it help or harm your heart?

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-03/w-hrt030915.php

Public Release: 10-Mar-2015
Wiley

New evidence published today in the Cochrane Library shows that hormone replacement therapy does not protect post-menopausal women against cardiovascular disease, and may even cause an increased risk of stroke.

HRT, now more commonly known as hormone therapy, is widely used for controlling menopausal symptoms. It has also been used for the prevention of cardiovascular disease in post-menopausal women. This latest evidence looked at the effects of using hormone therapy for at least six months and involved more than 40,000 women across the world.

The length of time women were on treatment, varied across the trials from seven months to just over 10 years.

Overall, the results showed no evidence that hormone therapy provides any protective effects against death from any cause, and specifically death from cardiovascular disease, non-fatal heart attacks or angina, either in healthy women or women with pre-existing heart disease. Instead the findings showed a small increased risk of stroke for post-menopausal women.

The authors also explored how much of an effect there was of starting HRT earlier. They found some evidence that women who started treatment within the first 10 years of their menopause, when menopausal symptoms are most common, seem to have a small protection against death and heart attacks, and no increased risk of stroke. But even in this group, the risk of deep vein thrombosis (DVT) increased.

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