Health

Estrogen linked to higher risk of dementia

NEW YORK - Older postmenopausal women who take estrogen significantly increase their risk of developing dementia, whether they take the hormone alone or combined with progestin, according to a study published in today's Journal of the American Medical Association.

A related study found that women 65 or older taking estrogen had slightly lower cognitive function, on average, than those taking a placebo - a difference that emerged within a year or two of starting estrogen therapy.

The studies represent the first detailed analyses of cognitive function to include data from the estrogen-only arm of the Women's Health Initiative, a multiyear clinical trial of more than 27,000 women sponsored by the National Institutes of Health and Wyeth-Ayerst Research.

"It's clear from the findings that estrogen hormone therapy should not be used to prevent dementia - it won't prevent it and in fact will increase the risk," said Stephen Rapp, co-author on both papers and professor of psychiatry at Wake Forest University School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, N.C.

At a time when millions of men rely on Viagra and other anti-impotence drugs to restore sexual function, researchers have found a less expensive, all-natural way for many of them to spice up their love life: lose weight.

In a study of obese men who suffered from erectile dysfunction, doctors in Italy found that nearly a third regained sexual ability after making lifestyle changes that included regular exercise and weight loss.

"This is the first compelling piece of evidence that changing lifestyle risks for erectile dysfunction carries with it a reasonable chance of sexual improvement," said Dr. Abraham Morgantaler, associate professor of urology at Harvard Medical School and author of The Viagra Myth, who was not involved in the study.

The findings, reported in today's Journal of the American Medical Association, could give men added incentive to lose weight - as if lower blood pressure, lower cholesterol and decreased risk of coronary heart disease aren't enough.

Fifty years after British researchers published the first study firmly linking cigarette smoking to lung cancer, the same scientist following the same group of British doctors has reported the most detailed and long-term results ever of the health effects of smoking. His stark conclusion: A life of cigarette smoking will be, on average, 10 years shorter than a life without it.

While the lethal effects of cigarette smoking have long been known, the new study, published Tuesday in the British Medical Journal, is the first to quantify the damage. In the 50-year study of a group of almost 35,000 British doctors, the pioneering epidemiologist Richard Doll, who's now 91, and his colleagues found that almost half of all persistent cigarette smokers were killed by their habit, and a quarter died before age 70.

The study also found, however, that kicking the cigarette habit had equally dramatic effects. He found, for instance, that someone who stops smoking by age 30 has the same average life expectancy as a nonsmoker, and someone who stops at 50 will lose four, rather than 10, years of life.

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