Early menopause and oestrogen therapy

Question : I am 44, and I have just developed menopause. My doctor is suggesting that I take up oestrogen hormone therapy from now on. He tells me that if I don't, my bones can become weaker, and I may develop a disease called osteoporosis. But now, I have been putting on weight. Do you think I will get a heart attack ?

Answer : If you have developed menopause while at 44, the chances are (a) that you did not have a good sex life all these years, and/or (b) that you are somewhat obese.

If you have been a thin person all this while, then you don't have to take oestrogen hormone treatment at all. My findings show that thin people will not develop any osteoporosis.

If you have been an obese person, the, your very obesity is due to an accumulation of far too much of calcium. This must have been essentially due to under-urination all the time. Normally, a substantial amount of calcium would have gone out of your body every month along with your menstrual flow. Therefore, there was no fear of developing atherosclerosis ( ie, hardening of arterioles due to calcium, cholesterol, etc ). Now, that you have menopaused, there is no way for the excessive calcium to get eliminated. Therefore, in future, the calcium would accumulate and stay in your body, making you increasingly obese. In that process, your arteries are bound to get damaged, and that will give you hypertension, and subsequently you can get heart attack.

If you undergo oestrogen hormone therapy, there is no certainty that you will get all the desired benefits, but the side effects can be disastrous. Research in thsi srea has not been finalised yet.

Do you know what the expert researcher Dr. Pamela S. Douglas ( 1997 ), specialist in coronary artery disease in women, and an academician in Harvard Medical School, who is also director of non-invasive cardiology, Beth Israel Hospital of Boston, Massachusetts, has to say about the use of oestrogen hormone ? Please read what she says :

" ... Radonmized trials in women are only now being undertaken; results will not be available for several years".

" While the benefits may seem large, there are methodological limitations in all available studies as well as significant risks associated with estrogen use and logistic problems with its prescription. Chief among the risk of estrogen use is endometrial cancer, for which unopposed estrogen therapy carries a five- to eightfold increased risk, associated with an estimated threefold increased risk of death ( Grady at al 1992, 1995; Ravnikar 1993 ) ...

"Estrogen may increase breast cancer risk, with meta-analyses showing little increased risk for short-term therapy, thereas a higher relative risk, up to 1.5, has been associated with long-term use ( over 10 years ) in the Nurses' Health Study ( grady et al 1992; Henrich 1992; Colditz et al 1995".

On balancing risk and benefits, Dr. Pamela Douglas has the following to say :

"Other considerations int he decision to use estrogen replacement include the drug's side effects, such as vaginal bleeing, the need for careful monitoring for breast and uterine cancers and endometrail hyperplasia, and the costs of therapy and of monitoring ( Grady et al 1992, Ravnikar 1993, Belchetz 1994, Martin and Freeman 1993 ).

Therefore, if I were you, i would not go for oestrogen therapy. Instead, i would hcoose to reverse-engineer my risk factos that were keeping me obese, and make myself thin in a natural manner. You can choose to do likewise.

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