WEST PALM BEACH,FL--More than five years ago the National Cancer Institute sponsored a study to examine the effects of hormone replacement therapy on women.
The study was stopped in 2002 because investigators discovered that women who used the hormones had an increased the risk of breast cancer.
How long does that elevated risk of breast cancer last after the hormone therapy is stopped??
Years ago, before there was any indication that hormone replacement therapy might be dangerous, Barbara Finley took hormones to deal symptoms associated with menopause. Now she struggles with a nagging feeling that perhaps those drugs contributed to her breast cancer.
Barbara Finley: "I'm in the middle of my chemo now."
Dr. Robert Green, oncologist: "When the Women's Health Initiative was initially published it showed that contrary to what we thought, that taking hormone replacement therapy was worse than actually not taking it. So it found that there was an increased risk of developing breast cancer for women who took hormone replacement therapy and there was actually an increased risk of cardiovascular events, strokes, heart attacks, blood clots in the legs and blood clots traveling to the lungs."
Now doctors routinely tell patients that they shouldn't take hormone replacement therapy unless there is a compelling reason for it. But some women who, like Barbara Finley, took hormone replacements continued to worry about how long that increased risk lasts. A recent study answered that question.
Dr. Green: "What it showed was that for women who had taken hormone replacement, the risk of developing breast cancer persisted for the approximately two years of follow up after the study terminated. The other risks of cardiovascular disease, heart attacks, strokes, blood clots did not continue to be elevated, but the risk for breast cancer did."
That news at least gives women a finite end to time period during which they should be concerned about their past use of hormone replacement therapy.
