096 - I have taken HRT for nearly 50 years and won’t ever stop it - Kay Anderson and Dr Louise Newson
The Dr Louise Newson Podcast
Dr Louise Newson
4.7 • 935 Ratings
🗓️ 27 April 2021
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Dr Newson has a fascinating conversation with Kay Anderson, a woman in her 80s who began taking HRT after a hysterectomy in 1972, when she was only 36. Kay remembers the frightening and devastating depression that suddenly engulfed her, as a mum with 3 young children, and how her gynaecologist agreed to use her as a 'guinea pig' and let her have some HRT.
They discuss the different types of HRT that Kay has taken and prescribing trends over the last 50 years, and Dr Newson explains how safe modern types of estrogen is through the skin, and how it can protect the health of your heart, bones and mind as you age. Kay has been the only one of her friends to take HRT and is also the only one who doesn't have to take any other medications!
Kay's top 3 tips:
- See another doctor if they won't give you HRT or try and make you stop taking it.
- Don't feel pressured to stop taking it, because if you do you will probably be right back where you started.
- Tell your friends and family what you want, so they can support you to get the right help for you.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Neuson Health Menopause podcast. I'm Dr. Louise Newson, a GP and menopause |
| 0:15.8 | specialist and I'm also the founder of the Menopause charity. In addition, I run the Newston Health |
| 0:22.5 | Menopause and Well-Being Clinic here in Stratford-upon-Avon. |
| 0:30.9 | Today on this podcast, I'm going to introduce to you my mother-in-law, Kay Anderson, who I've |
| 0:36.3 | been trying to persuade for the last few months |
| 0:38.5 | to record with me, because as many of you might have heard, I recorded my mother about a year ago, |
| 0:44.2 | and a lot of people found it really interesting to hear her views about HRT. So I have Kay with me |
| 0:50.4 | today, and I'm delighted to introduce you to her. So thanks Kay for agreeing to be recorded today. |
| 0:57.6 | My pleasure. So I'm not sure whether you are actually officially the person that I know who's |
| 1:02.7 | taken HRT for the longest, but you must be up there in the records. So how long have you been |
| 1:09.2 | taking HRT for? I think I was 36 when have you been taking H.R.T.4? |
| 1:15.1 | I think I was 36 when I first started taking it. |
| 1:17.7 | And are you allowed to say how old you are now? |
| 1:18.8 | 85. |
| 1:23.5 | I don't usually share that with the world, but... Oh, well, it's great that you have because I think it's really important because, as you know, we see and speak to a lot of women in the clinic, but also just generally through social media, who have been told they have to stop taking HRT or they're too old to take it or they're not allowed to take it at a certain age. |
| 1:41.8 | And I'm not sure that anyone's going to stop you taking your |
| 1:45.1 | HRT, are they? No, they're definitely not. No, I shall take it forever. Excellent. So, Dennis, |
| 1:53.2 | what happened then when you were, because 36 is young, obviously, to be starting to take |
| 1:57.6 | hormone replacement therapy. So what happened to you when you were in your 30s? |
| 2:02.1 | When I was 34, I had a hysterectomy. And that was because of fibroids, they started to grow again. |
| 2:09.6 | As I didn't want any more children, I'd got three. I decided that hysterectomy will be better for me. |
| 2:15.4 | At least my gynecologist told me that. |
... |
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