Reassessing Safety of Vaginal Estrogen in Women with Breast Cancer

Women with breast cancer prescribed adjuvant endocrine therapy often experience side effects such as arthralgias, hot flashes, urinary symptoms, and vaginal symptoms including dryness and dyspareunia. Because adjuvant therapy is prescribed for 5 years or more, compliance and adherence are major issues, and these side effects often contribute to discontinuation. Efforts to mitigate side effects are important, but use of hormones to offset them raises concern about possible increased risk of breast cancer recurrence.

Using a national prescription database and the Danish Breast Cancer Group clinical database, investigators evaluated the use of vaginal estrogen therapy (VET) and menopausal hormone therapy (MHT) in a cohort of postmenopausal wome…