Lara Grinevitch BSc, ND; 2007
These were the headlines in the media last month, and they were very misleading. There was never any suggestion that natural progesterone causes cancer. The concern about cancer is a concern about oestradiol (a strong oestrogen that is used in some, but not all, bio-identical hormone formulas). If a troche does contain oestradiol, then there is a risk for the breasts and the uterus. Natural progesterone offsets the risk for the breasts, but the conventional medical community in Australia argues that it does not protect the uterus. The Medical Journal of Australia put forward three cases of stage 1 endometrial cancer in women who had used oestradiol-containing troches. (1). (Stage 1 endometrial cancer is relatively mild, and is expected to have a good outcome.) No definitive proof is available that the troches had been the cause of the cancer. The women had been on the troches for 18 months, 3 years and 6 years. Yes, it is true that oestradiol supplements require progesterone to reduce the risk of endometrial cancer. Artificial progesterone, called progestin, was introduced as part of HRT in the 1960’s to do just that. It was a pharmaceutical band-aid for the epidemic of endometrial cancer that had resulted from conventional oestrogen HRT. Natural progesterone would have been the more logical choice at that time (because protecting the endometrium is one of progesterone’s normal jobs in the body). And natural progesterone would have had another benefit, had it become part of conventional HRT: Natural progesterone also protects against BREAST CANCER. (Progestins do the opposite: They INCREASE the risk for breast cancer.) The protective effect on the breasts is the main reason that natural health practitioners prefer natural progesterone to progestin.Although natural progesterone could have been the logical choice for endometrial cancer prevention all along, there were two reasons why it was not initially used: 1) At the time that Progestins were introduced (1960’s), natural progesterone was not available except by injection. 2) As a natural hormone, progesterone was not patentable. Today, technology allows progesterone to be absorbed through the skin or ingested. There is evidence that it is absorbed, and there is evidence that it does protect against endometrial cancer (2,3). In parts of Europe, ‘micronised progesterone’ (natural progesterone) has become standard care in gynaecology. The fact that it remains a fringe prescription in Australia is more to do with entrenched practice than medical science
Xanya Sofra Weiss