Women's Health Initiative Investigators' Letter To Editor Responds To Wall Street Journal Article On WHI Findings

A recent Wall Street Journal article about the findings of the five-year, $725 million NIH-sponsored Women's Health Initiative on the effects of hormone replacement therapy included some "misperceptions," Jacques Rossouw -- chief of the WHI branch at the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute -- and Marcia Stefanick -- chair of the WHI executive committee and a professor at Stanford University -- write in a Journal letter to the editor (Rossouw/Stefanick, Wall Street Journal, 7/21).

WHI researchers in July 2002 ended the study on combination HRT three years early because they determined that the treatment might increase the risk for heart disease, invasive breast cancer and other health problems. According to the Journal article, in the five years since the study was released, many in the medical community have said "some aspects" of the initial findings "were either misleading" or "overgeneralized in large part because they excluded many of the study's own investigators and physicians from the first review" (Kaiser Daily Women's Health Policy Report, 7/9).

According to Rossouw and Stefanick, NIH and WHI researchers "are jointly responsible for all scientific articles arising from the study," and both "parties stand by the original findings and conclusions." The most recent analysis of data from the study, conducted earlier this year, "included some data not available" to researchers in 2002, Rossouw and Stefanick write. "The latest analyses add some further reassurance to women wishing to take hormone therapy in the short term for the relief of hot flashes and night sweats," Rossouw and Stefanick write, adding, "They don't provide evidence that even estrogen alone can help prevent heart attacks in the long term." Rossouw and Stefanick conclude that "more effective options" than HRT use are recommended to lower heart disease risk, "including adopting healthy lifestyles and identifying and treating risk factors, such as high blood cholesterol and high blood pressure" (Wall Street Journal, 7/21).

Correction
The Journal on Saturday printed a correction that says the article on WHI "incorrectly sa[id] the WHI intended to address only whether the heart protection women get from taking hormones at a younger age continues with long-term use." According to the correction, WHI clinical trials were "designed to answer many questions" (Wall Street Journal, 7/21).

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