Bloody hormones
Apr. 19th, 2007 07:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trixtah(And I'm not just saying that because I'm being painfully visited by the goddess, only four days late, only one day before I'm joing on a fun jaunt overnight to Sydney with the CDL, oh no!)
HRT puts you at a much more elevated risk of getting cancer, especially breast cancer. I knew this 15 years ago, when my aunt (who'd been on HRT for nearly a decade due to a full hysterectomy) had to have both breasts removed due to malignant growths. When she went on the HRT, there was no mention of that risk. When she developed the breast cancer, there was some feet-shuffling and some muttering about "higher incidence due to artificial estrogen" from the doctors. Oh, and my grandmother, her mother, died of cancer, so it's not as if there were no other risk factors at all. Fuckers.
So, how many of you knew that fact? How much is it in the public consciousness that HRT will appreciably up your risk of cancer? From the amount of of prescribing in that area going on for menopausal women, I'd say it's not very much in the public consciousness at all.
What about the transwomen out there who have been or are on HRT? How much was it mentioned that your risk is greater too? And what about those high dosages (higher than for menopausal cis-women) that are often prescribed for transwomen for the first several years? What about the risks there? Even the usually-comprehensive T-Vox site is fairly quiet on the risks associated with artificial estrogens.
The reason I'm on about this is due to the release of a recent study that shows that users of HRT are at 63% higher risk of developing ovarian, uterine or breast cancers than women who have never had HRT. Apparently, regulatory bodies in the UK have said in the last 5 years that HRT should be used as little as possible and for as briefly as possible. I'd say that message hadn't trickled down either.
Perhaps the fact that The Lancet is publishing the study, and that there is obvious media interest, will get the word out. Finally.
My thoughts? Don't use HRT unless you have to. For me, it won't be until I'm 80, and suffering from brittle bones (if I ever do).
For MTFs, if your treatments weren't carried out in conjunction with anti-androgen measures (and thus incurred higher estrogen doses), you'd probably want to reduce as many of your other risk factors as possible. Check your breasts regularly (I suppose not having a uterus and ovaries is a help, in this instance). And I bloody hope that someone gets off their arses and specifically studies the kinds of risks MTFs are exposed to in this realm. Perhaps reaching puberty in a male body helps? Or hinders? Who the fuck knows, at this stage?
Perhaps a higher profile will lead to some research on the causes of the elevated risk. Is it something about the artificial form? Taking a hormonal substance that isn't produced by your own body? The dosage? The delivery of that dosage (which would be more homogeneous than the body's natural cycle, with its daily, not to mention monthly, ebbs and flows)? Let's hope some momentum starts happening in this area.
HRT puts you at a much more elevated risk of getting cancer, especially breast cancer. I knew this 15 years ago, when my aunt (who'd been on HRT for nearly a decade due to a full hysterectomy) had to have both breasts removed due to malignant growths. When she went on the HRT, there was no mention of that risk. When she developed the breast cancer, there was some feet-shuffling and some muttering about "higher incidence due to artificial estrogen" from the doctors. Oh, and my grandmother, her mother, died of cancer, so it's not as if there were no other risk factors at all. Fuckers.
So, how many of you knew that fact? How much is it in the public consciousness that HRT will appreciably up your risk of cancer? From the amount of of prescribing in that area going on for menopausal women, I'd say it's not very much in the public consciousness at all.
What about the transwomen out there who have been or are on HRT? How much was it mentioned that your risk is greater too? And what about those high dosages (higher than for menopausal cis-women) that are often prescribed for transwomen for the first several years? What about the risks there? Even the usually-comprehensive T-Vox site is fairly quiet on the risks associated with artificial estrogens.
The reason I'm on about this is due to the release of a recent study that shows that users of HRT are at 63% higher risk of developing ovarian, uterine or breast cancers than women who have never had HRT. Apparently, regulatory bodies in the UK have said in the last 5 years that HRT should be used as little as possible and for as briefly as possible. I'd say that message hadn't trickled down either.
Perhaps the fact that The Lancet is publishing the study, and that there is obvious media interest, will get the word out. Finally.
My thoughts? Don't use HRT unless you have to. For me, it won't be until I'm 80, and suffering from brittle bones (if I ever do).
For MTFs, if your treatments weren't carried out in conjunction with anti-androgen measures (and thus incurred higher estrogen doses), you'd probably want to reduce as many of your other risk factors as possible. Check your breasts regularly (I suppose not having a uterus and ovaries is a help, in this instance). And I bloody hope that someone gets off their arses and specifically studies the kinds of risks MTFs are exposed to in this realm. Perhaps reaching puberty in a male body helps? Or hinders? Who the fuck knows, at this stage?
Perhaps a higher profile will lead to some research on the causes of the elevated risk. Is it something about the artificial form? Taking a hormonal substance that isn't produced by your own body? The dosage? The delivery of that dosage (which would be more homogeneous than the body's natural cycle, with its daily, not to mention monthly, ebbs and flows)? Let's hope some momentum starts happening in this area.
