Estrogen treatment

“Estrogen Treatment” means that estrogen alone is used as a therapy. Estrogen treatment used to be called “Estrogen Replacement Therapy” but “replacement” is a term and a concept that are totally wrong—menopause is part of women’s normal lifecycle and low estrogen levels then are perfectly normal. CeMCOR wants to change concepts and practice related to estrogen therapy in these two ways: 1) estrogen and progesterone work together with progesterone counterbalancing the effects of too much estrogen—estrogen should always be taken with progesterone because estrogen and progesterone are partners working together in all our tissues; and 2) estradiol or the bio-identical form of estrogen, should always be taken as a gel, patch or cream and never as a pill because estrogen by mouth increases blood clotting.Investigators at CeMCOR are investigating whether estrogen-alone therapy is ever good or appropriate therapy. But, you may say, “I thought adding progesterone or progestin was only to prevent endometrial cancer.” Yes, progesterone does prevent the estrogen-treatment related endometrial cancer, but that’s only one of the many reasons to also take progesterone. Whenever estrogen treatment is taken, progesterone should also be taken since both hormones are part of the normal, ovulatory menstrual cycle. That means that a woman who has had a hysterectomy who is taking estrogen doesn’t need progesterone’s endometrial protection but she still needs progesterones effects for bones, breasts, heart and brain (as well as every tissue in her body). Take progesterone with estrogen.For over 75 years we have known that taking estrogen as a pill increases the risk of potentially fatal blood clots. In the last 15 years we have had non-pill forms of estrogen treatment available that don’t increase clot risks. Therefore, always ask for estradiol as a cream, patch or gel.