Hormone Replacement Therapy Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Hormone Replacement Therapy, including details on hrt, menopause, natural hrt, effects, risks.

Effect of hormone replacement therapy on the production of bone-resorbing cytokines by peripheral blood cells in postmenopausal women.

Uemura H, Kamada M, Maegawa M, Ohmoto Y, Murata K, Kuwahara A, Matsuzaki T, Yasui T, Takeji T, Irahara M

Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, School of Medicine, University of Tokushima, Tokushima, Japan. uemura@clin.med.tokushima-u.ac.jp

We studied the effects of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) with estrogen on postmenopausal changes in the production of bone-resorbing cytokines interleukin 1 beta (IL-1beta) and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNFalpha). Both cytokines were measured in the supernatants of lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-stimulated whole-blood cells from 72 untreated and 44 HRT-treated women by ELISA. The levels of IL-1beta were significantly higher in women in their 40s and 50s and in postmenopausal women than in women in their teens, 20s and 30s, while the levels of TNFalpha did not show any changes related to age. Both levels in HRT-treated women were significantly lower than those in untreated women at almost every postmenopausal stage. In a prospective study, HRT induced significant declines in both levels. These results show that estrogen decreases the accelerated production of IL-1beta and reduces the production of TNFalpha in postmenopausal women at each postmenopausal stage, even in late-postmenopausal women.

Published 13 June 2005 in Horm Metab Res, 37(4): 226-30.
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