HRT and gynaecologic cancer after WHI: old stuff or new doubts?

Previous studies had shown that there is little concern about endometrial cancer risk with hormone replacement therapy (HRT), whereas the risk of ovarian cancer is still debated. A new paper based on the women's health initiative (WHI) study devoted to gynaecologic cancers has been published in the October 2003 issue of JAMA, leading to the conclusion that also for endometrial and ovarian cancer risk, as the first WHI publication did for breast cancer risk, the previous large studies have been confirmed. About follow-up the authors conclude that, "The increased burden of endometrial biopsies required to assess vaginal bleeding further limits the acceptability of this regimen." These conclusions deserve a thorough analysis and must be read in the light of the burden of available epidemiological and clinical data and of recommended clinical practice. In the WHI trial the use of continuous combined HRT has resulted in a considerable increase of both imaging and invasive exams, to investigate women with bleeding or spotting, but the findings of these exams have been invariably negative. As far as, all published studies agree on the fact that continuous combined HRT either has no effect or significantly reduces the risk of both endometrial hyperplasia and cancer, there should be no reason to close-watching endometrium of women using this regimen with a different strategy from that employed on any healthy woman.