Post-Menopausal Women -- The Good News and the Bad

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With the mistaken impression that adding progestin to estrogen (in Hormone Replacement Therapy--HRT,) reduces the risk of cancer from the estrogen alone, doctors have been prescribing combination pills to post-menopausal women. Now there is both good and bad news about this.

Since the good news is so good, we'll give you the bad news first. The January 26th issue of the Journal of the American Med. Assn., reports that women who took the combination had a 20% higher risk of cancer than those who took the estrogen-only pills.

Now the good news! In addition to there being a soy alternative to HRT, a report in the journal Nutrition and Cancer*, concluded, "This study showed that the addition of 5 or 10 'grams] of ground flaxseed to the daily diet of healthy, postmenopausal women significantly increased ...urinary 'estrogen] excretion. ...These results suggest that ground flaxseed may be chemoprotective in postmenopausal women." So instead of increasing your risk of cancer, you may be able to decrease it.

*vol. 33, l999, by Drs. Haggans, Hutchins, Slavin et all, Dept. of Food Science and Nutrition, U. of Minnesota, St. Paul, MN 55108, Dept. of Nutrition, College of St. Benedict, St. Joseph, MN 56374 and Division of Biostatistics, School of Pub. Health, U. of Minn., Minn. MN 55455.