Early Hormone Therapy May Be Safe for Women's Hearts

By Kathleen Doheny HealthDay Reporter Latest Womens Health News

MONDAY, July 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Healthy women at low risk of cardiovascular disease may be able to take hormone replacement therapy soon after menopause for a short time without harming their hearts, according to a new study.

Previous studies, including the large-scale Women's Health Initiative, found that hormone replacement therapy had harmful effects on the heart. But, many of those women were older when they began the hormone treatments, and much further past menopause.

In this new study, researchers wanted to look at how markers of heart disease, such as the thickness of artery walls, might be affected if healthy women began hormone therapy soon after menopause.

"We were expecting it to slow down the progress of arterial disease," said study researcher Dr. S. Mitchell Harman, chief of the endocrine division and interim chief of medicine at the Phoenix VA Healthcare System. That, in turn, would reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke.

The results, however, did not turn out that way. "We cannot recommend estrogen for the prevention of cardiovascular disease, even in this younger healthier group," he said.

The good news? "It doesn't hurt either," Harman said. "It looks like a wash." So, for women who are affected by the common menopausal symptoms of hot flashes and night sweats, taking hormone replacement therapy for a few years doesn't appear to jeopardize heart health, he said, at least in this healthy group of women.

Findings from the study were published July 29 in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

The study was funded primarily by Kronos Longevity Research Institute, which is supported by the not-for-profit Aurora Foundation. The foundation has no pharmaceutical company ties.

The study, known as the Kronos Early Estrogen Prevention Study (KEEPS), was a four-year clinical trial to compare the effects of three regimens in more than 700 women. The participants were randomly assigned to one of three groups: low-dose oral hormone replacement therapy with estrogen and progesterone; a skin patch of estrogen and oral progesterone; or placebo treatment, with no hormones given.

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Early Hormone Therapy May Be Safe for Women's Hearts