After the Women's Health Initiative: Postmenopausal women's experiences with discontinuing estrogen replacement therapy

Abstract

Objective: To gather information about women's responses to the publication of the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) and to determine what proportion of women stopped hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and whether the technique of discontinuation affected the recurrence of menopausal symptoms.

Methods: 73 subjects were identified through VA pharmacy records and were mailed a letter detailing the results of the WHI. A follow-up questionnaire was mailed several months later to the same population.

Results: 48 subjects responded and were eligible for inclusion in the study. Mean age was 62 years; 37 (77%) stopped taking HRT, and 11 (23%) continued. Twenty patients stopped abruptly, and 17 tapered off HRT. Eight (40%) of the group who stopped abruptly experienced recurrent menopausal symptoms, compared with 12 (71%) of the group who tapered HRT.

Conclusions: In a population of women veterans, 77% stopped HRT after publication of the WHI. Tapering HRT, rather than stopping abruptly, did not reduce the recurrence of menopausal symptoms in our patient population.