Questions and answers about menopause and women's health

By Jane Weaver, Deputy health editor

When the government-funded Womens Health Initiative study was abruptly halted in 2002, the impact was huge, swift and charged with emotion. Until the first results were released from the groundbreaking research, most doctors and older women believed that taking hormone replacement pills would protect their hearts and keep them young,healthy and hot flash-free.

Courtesy of Dr. Vivian Pinn

Instead the hormone drugs -- to the surprise of researchers at the National Institutes of Health who had founded the study -- were shown to cause a small, but significant increase in the risk of breast cancer. Thousands of women participating in the study were instructed to stop taking the drugs, a combination of estrogen and progestin, and contact their doctors.

The findings affected millions of American women taking hormone therapy. Few doctors had clear answers for their menopausal patientsbecause the medical community itself had been caught off guard by the results. There was plenty of frustration (Will my hot flashes return?), confusion (Was taking estrogen alone safe?) and fear (Am I at risk of heart attack, breast cancer or stroke?).

When the Womens Health Initiative started in 1991, the 15-year randomized clinical trial was one of the largest studies of its type in the world. It was designed to compare the effects of hormone replacement therapy, vitamin D and calcium and low-fat diets on more than 160,000 women.

Hormone study still worries women, 10 years later

Womens health pioneer Dr. Vivian Pinn, who until she retired last year was the NIH's first permanent director of the Office of Research on Womens Health and one of the leading figures of the Womens Health Initiative, spoke with msnbc.com about the lasting impact of the landmark study.

Q. How did the Womens Health Initiative change the way medical science thinks about womens health?

A. This was the first major opportunity to look at the health of women in the post-menopausal years and to determine, through a long-term randomized clinical trial, the validity of commonly used treatments to prevent the most common conditions that lead to mortality and morbidity of post-menopausal women.

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Questions and answers about menopause and women's health