What is the controversy around hormone therapy for menopause? Elizabeth Tracey reports

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The FDA has recently removed black box warnings, indicating a medication is potentially risky, from hormone therapy for menopause. The warning was originally put on in 2003 after a study seemed to show increased risks for cardiovascular disease, breast cancer and dementia in women who took it. Wen Shen, a menopause expert at Johns Hopkins, says she and other menopause experts were advocating for removal from one type of hormone therapy.

Shen: What we were pushing for was the black box warning to come off of the vaginal estrogen. Vaginal estrogens are so low dose and minimal to no systemic absorption. There's been enough clinical trials that showed that it did not increase breast cancer recurrence risk and so all you need is for that black box warning to scare you off and in the meantime you're so miserable.     :26

Shen has concerns that total removal of warnings might empower clinicians with no expertise in hormone therapy for menopause to begin prescribing it, and that may be risky. At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.