097 - Trying to right 20 years of misinformation and hysteria about HRT - Professor Rob Langer and Dr Louise Newson

The Dr Louise Newson Podcast

Dr Louise Newson

Medicine, Health & Fitness

4.7 • 935 Ratings

🗓️ 4 May 2021

⏱️ 48 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Dr Newson speaks with Professor Robert Langer in this episode. Robert Langer is Professor Emeritus in Family and Preventive Medicine at the University of California in San Diego. He was also an investigator of the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) Study. Together, they discuss how the WHI Study from 2002 turned the world upside down for women and how they have both been trying to right it ever since.

Professor Langer describes in detail what was understood about the benefits of hormone replacement therapy before the WHI study, how the notorious study came about and why it was finished prematurely and so badly misreported in the media. His unique account of how the events unfolded helps listeners to understand the bigger picture of why healthcare professionals and women remain unaware of the benefits of HRT and are often overly cautious of the perceived risks to this day.

Professor Langer's 3 top tips are:

1. All of the evidence shows that for women who are within 10 years of their menopause, or under the age of 60, if she has reason to take HRT, there is absolutely no need to be concerned about HRT. For these women the benefits strongly outweigh the risks.

2. There's no reason to stop taking HRT at any age, if you've been taking it from the time of your perimenopause or within 10 years of your menopause.

3. With a knowledgeable practitioner, there's no reason that a woman who is past her menopause or over 60, can't start taking HRT, as long as the clinician is aware of how to start slowly and get hormone levels to the right point.

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 Menopause
0:23.0	and Well-Being Clinic here in Stratford-upon-Avon.
0:32.1	So today, I'm really excited to have with me Professor Robert Langer, who is a Professor
0:37.4	Emeritus of family medicine
0:39.2	and preventative medicine from the University of California in San Diego. And I first heard him talk
0:46.1	at a conference in Prague. It was one of the International Menopause Society conferences a few years
0:51.4	ago. And at the end of his speech, he just had this most amazing words that I've used in quite a few
0:58.0	slides, which were, let's get past the misinformation and hysteria of the WHOHI and stop denying
1:05.9	the benefits of hormone replacement therapy.
1:09.2	So I'm going to explain what that means in a bit, but firstly,
1:12.1	welcome Robert. Thank you so much for coming and joining me on the podcast today.
1:15.9	My pleasure. Very happy to be here and to do what I can to dispel misinformation
1:21.5	about the Women's Health Initiative and about hormone replacement in general.
1:27.9	Brilliant.
1:28.4	So before we get started on that, would you mind just telling me a bit about your
1:32.5	background and your professional career up to now, if that's all right?
1:37.1	Sure.
1:37.8	I started out as a family doctor in private practice.
1:42.8	I was quite interested in what I might do in order to maintain
1:48.6	people's health as they progressed through the years.
1:54.0	And as I developed my practice originally, I became interested in longitudinal outcomes in the patients I was going
	...

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