Public release date: 15-Jan-2008
SEATTLE – Postmenopausal women who take combined estrogen/progestin hormone-replacement therapy for three years or more face a fourfold increased risk of developing various forms of lobular breast cancer, according to new findings by researchers at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.
“Previous research indicated that five or more years of combined hormone-therapy use was necessary to increase overall breast-cancer risk,” said Christopher I. Li, M.D., Ph.D., the lead author of the report, published in the January issue of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention. “Our study, the first specifically designed to evaluate the relationship between combined HRT and lobular breast cancers, suggests that a significantly shorter length of exposure to such hormones may confer an increased risk.
The researchers found that current users of combined HRT had a 2.7-fold and 3.3-fold elevated risk of lobular and ductal-lobular cancer, respectively, regardless of tumor stage, size or number of lymph nodes involved. Only women who used combined HRT for three or more years faced an increased risk of lobular cancer. Among mixed ductal-lobular cases, hormone therapy increased the risk of tumors that were predominantly lobular but not tumors that had predominantly ductal characteristics.
The incidence of invasive lobular and ductal-lobular breast cancers has risen rapidly in the United States, increasing 52 percent and 96 percent, respectively, between 1987 and 1999, whereas rates of ductal cancer have increased only 3 percent during this time.
“These findings are still of considerable public-health importance considering the estimated 57 million prescriptions for menopausal hormone therapy that continue to be filled in the United States,” Li said.
Ralph’s Note- This tsunami of problems was forecast years in advance by good Doctors. Yet the science was pushed under the carpet. The Pharmaceutical companies who participated in this cover up, should be responsible for the medical bills of the coming storm. In another words, we have not seen the end of this.