U.S.-HEALTH: AFTER HEALTH SCARE, MENOPAUSE TREATMENT MATURES.

By Molly M. Ginty

NEW YORK, July 10, 2005 (WOMENSENEWS)--The news rattled Marilyn Kentz even more than the hot flashes and mood swings she suffered.

"In July 2002, when the Women's Health Initiative found the drugs I was taking for menopause could increase the risk of heart attack, I was not only shocked, but terrified," says Kentz, 57, a writer in Los Angeles. "My father died of heart disease at the age of 42 and, determined to avoid his fate; I quit hormone therapy as soon as I heard about the study's results."

Without her daily doses of synthetic estrogen and progestin, hot flashes kept her up nights and mood swings left her weeping inconsolably. "My symptoms were so bad that I decided to go back on medication after a six-month break," says Kentz.

Health advocates say one third of the former users of hormone therapy--pharmaceutical companies put that total figure at over 18 million--are likely going without treatment or trying alternative remedies.

Kentz, for instance, is now using the Femring, a vaginal ring that releases estrogen. Taken along with progestin pills, this regimen is helping her feel much better.

Hormone therapy had been offered to tens of millions of U.S. women entering menopause, the stage during which women stop menstruating and estrogen levels drop. First prescribed in the late 1960s, these drugs--either an estrogen-progestin combination or an estrogen-only version for women who had had hysterectomies--were touted as the "cure" for menopause and as protective against heart disease and breast cancer.