Post-Menopausal Women Should Not Take Hormone Therapy to Prevent Chronic Conditions
In new draft guidelines, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) recommends against the use of combined estrogen and progestin for the primary prevention of chronic conditions in post-menopausal persons, including those who have had a hysterectomy.The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force is “an independent, volunteer panel of national experts in disease prevention and evidence-based medicine,” per its website.The current draft is consistent with the most recent USPSTF statement, from 2017, which recommended against the use of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) for primary prevention of chronic conditions. Nothing has changed, says Stephanie S. Faubion, MD, an internal medicine doctor at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and the medical director of the North American Menopause Society, and not a member of the task force.“Currently, hormone therapy is recommended only for…