According to new research published this month in Europe’s leading cardiology journal, the European Heart Journal, women who take hormone replacement therapy (HRT) to treat menopause symptoms do not have a higher than usual risk of heart attack, especially if they use a cream or skin patch(1). The observational study of over 698,098 healthy Danish women aged 51-69 represents the latest turn on the ongoing debate over the safety of HRT and suggests that large, widely publicized studies linking HRT use to cardiovascular events and breast cancer may not be the last word on treatment. As a result of the declining sales of hormonal replacement therapy (HRT) in recent years caused by such safety concerns, non-hormonal treatments for menopausal symptoms had an estimated revenue potential of over $535million across the US and five major EU markets (UK, US, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Spain) in 2007, according to a new report from independent market analyst Datamonitor "Stakeholder Opinions: Non-hormonal Treatments for Menopausal Symptoms 2008". However, with current developmental drugs failing to provide a substantial reduction in symptoms, their use is expected to be limited to a minority of patients who are unable to take HRT.

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