Estrogen replacement therapy, subsyndromal depression, and orthostatic blood pressure regulation

Although estrogen replacement therapy (ERT) alleviates depressed moods in postmenopausal women, it is not known whether ERT is equally effective in reducing affective and somatic depressive complaints. One of the authors' goals in this study was to examine possible differences between women receiving and not receiving ERT. The authors studied a group of postmenopausal women. Somatic symptoms in the ERT group were significantly lower than in the Non-ERT group. Affective scores were only marginally lower in the ERT group (p = .06). After controlling for affective depression, the advantage of ERT remained significant with respect to somatic levels, but control for somatic levels essentially eliminated the effects of ERT on affective depression values. Second, in response to orthostatic challenge, the change in systolic blood pressure was significantly smaller in the ERT group. Apparently ERT is associated with more effective blood pressure regulation. Thus there are several potential benefits of ERT, despite recent evidence finding several untoward effects of long-term treatment.