Editorials

Breast cancer and hormonal supplements in postmenopausal women

Breast cancer is a hormonal cancer that is common after the menopause, and hence the effects of hormone supplementation are of enormous concern to women. The epidemiology of breast cancer remains largely unexplained, as known risk factors explain only around 40% of the disease. This is due to its prolonged, complicated, and multifactorial aetiology. Studies suffer from subtle selection processes that lead to unmeasured confounding, from long delays in measuring the effects on early carcinogenic changes, and from imprecision in investigations of modifying effects among important subgroups.

Hormone supplements are clearly effective in relieving menopausal symptoms and preventing osteoporosis if taken for long enough. Do these and the putative protective effect on coronary heart disease¹ make them the most important advance in preventive medicine in the past 50 years?² Endometrial cancer is a serious problem . . . [Full text of this article]

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