Breast Pain with HRT for Menopause Symptoms

Using hormone replacement therapy to treat postmenopausal symptoms may result in breast discomfort. This can, in turn, be associated with increased breast tissue density (the percent of the breast composed of dense tissue). And it’s now known that women with dense tissue in more than 75% of the breast have about 4 times the risk of developing breast cancer than women with little or no dense breast tissue. (In fact, breast density is an inherited feature.)

This adds importance to the results of a Californian study reported in the Archives of Internal Medicine. Scientists conducted a study of 600 women who had mammograms at a 12-month interval, before and after taking either placebo, or one of two forms of HRT (estrogen plus progestin). Breast density was calculated and breast discomfort was quantified using a standardized questionnaire. The researchers found that women with new-onset breast discomfort had a 3.9% increase in percent breast density compared with a 0.6% increase in women without discomfort.

What’s the consequence of this finding? Women put on HRT who get breast discomfort should let their physician know, so that appropriate steps can be taken – stop the HRT, genetic testing, mammograms at closer intervals, etc. It’s not worth increasing the risk for breast cancer to abolish symptoms that are, in general, transitory. (Of course, it’s easy for a mere man to make that observation.)