LONDON: An expert on women health believes hormone therapy, given at the right time, can protect against heart disease, despite a study four years ago linking it to an increase in heart attacks and strokes.

Professor Virginia Miller of the US Mayo Clinic College of Medicine believes timing is key and menopausal women given hormone replacement therapy (HRT) early are likely to benefit from a reduced risk of heart disease.

Leaving treatment until 10 years or so after the menopause, however, may be counter-productive.

“There seems to be protection if you begin treatment between the ages of 50 and 58. If you begin the treatment late, that is when harm is found,” she told reporters before addressing a meeting of the British Pharmacological Society in Oxford this week. “What we are interested in is defining the proportion of the population who may benefit.”

Until 2002, most data suggested that HRT was associated with a 30 per cent or more reduction in heart disease risk.—Reuters