By Lucy McBride | As a physician, I was trained with the same mantra: that hormone therapy was only for women who were absolutely miserable, and that if we were to prescribe it, it was for the least amount of time at the smallest dose.
That was completely wrong.
In 2002, part of the Women’s Health Initiative study was halted prematurely for a press release that essentially stated that hormone therapy caused breast cancer—when in actuality, the women who took estrogen alone (those without a uterus) actually had a reduced risk for breast cancer.
The mangling of that messaging is in large part responsible for scaring a generation of physicians off prescribing hormone therapy and terrifying generations of women away from taking the very things—estrogen and progesterone—that improve the immediate symptoms of menopause (such as hot flashes, night sweats, vaginal dryness and recurrent UTIs) and prevent the long-term consequences of estrogen depletion like osteoporosis, heart disease and premature cognitive decline.
Every time you refuse to accept a doctor telling you, “That’s just aging,” you aren’t just advocating for yourself. You’re doing structural work. You’re demanding to be seen as a full person, not as a set of body parts.
The questions women ask in exam rooms are how the gap between medical evidence and clinical practice closes. It’s how we close the disparity between men’s health and women’s health.
Health, after all, isn’t about having all the answers. It’s about asking better questions—of yourself, and of the people responsible for your care.
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