Certain hormone replacement therapy appears to increase the risk of heart disease and serious blood clots in menopausal women Estrogen/progestin pills increased women’s risk of heart disease by 21% and blood clots by 61% Hormone patches, creams and gels didn’t carry the same blood clot risk THURSDAY, Nov. 28, 2024 (HealthDay News) -- Certain hormone replacement therapy pills appear to increase the risk of heart disease and serious blood clots in women going through , a says. Estrogen/progestin pills increased women’s risk of heart disease by 21% and risk of life-threatening blood clots by 61%, researchers found.
Similarly, the synthetic hormone pill tibolone increased risk of heart disease by 46% and nearly doubled the risk of stroke and heart attack, results show. However, tibolone did not increase risk of blood clots, “highlighting the varying effects of different hormones on cardiovascular disease,” wrote the research team led by , a doctoral student with Uppsala University in Sweden. Tibolone is not approved for use in the U.
S., and its use has been decreasing in Sweden, researchers noted. “This drop is encouraging; however, in 2018, approximately 1000 women initiated tibolone, which is estimated to have caused one stroke or .
.. heart disease event,” the researchers wrote.
Hormone replacement therapy is used to relieve menopause symptoms such as hot flashes and night sweats. For the study, researchers analyzed data on more than 919,000 healthy women in Swede.