It's the Brian Lairn Show on WNYC.

I'm Bridget Bergen, senior reporter in the WNYC in Gothamist Newsroom sitting in for Brian.

Welcome back, everyone.

Have you seen the news that the FDA is calling to remove warning labels

from hormone therapy products used for treating menopause? Currently, all menopause treatments

containing estrogen carry warning labels, noting increased risk of strokes, blood clots, probable

dementia, and breast cancer, regardless of formulation.

Last week, the Food and Drug Administration held a panel in which a dozen physicians and researchers advocated for this change, but some advocates are concerned that the FDA commissioner, Dr. Marty

Mark Carey, and the panel of experts at Thursday's meeting underplayed the risks associated

with hormone treatments. With me now to talk about the risks and benefits of hormonal menopause

treatments and what the possible removal of warning labels could mean for patients and their doctors

is Dr. Jen Gunter. She's an OBGYN and pain medicine physician and author of the books,

The Menopause Manifesto, and Blood, the Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Monstration.

Dr. Gunter, welcome to WNYC.

Thank you for having me.

And before we get into the debate onurling in Washington, can you just

start us off with the basics of this issue? We're talking about hormones here, so it might be

useful to explain the science of menopause, what's going on in the body when we enter menopause,

and why does this happen? Sure. So menopause is the end of ovulation. So puberty is the start of ovulation. Menopause is the end. And we say that a woman is in menopause when she's a year from her final period if she's over the age of 45. Because obviously we don't really know it's your final period until, you know, it's really your final period. There's a time leading up to that final period

that we call the menopause transition that many people call perimenopause. That is associated with

changes in cycles and symptoms can also start then. So in addition to just irregular cycles,

people may have symptoms of menopause starting in their

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