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Reproductive Health
- Breastfeeding
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- Patient Materials
- Increase in breastfeeding
- Increasing women's lifespan
- Policy of inclusion of women in clinical trials
- Improvements in breast cancer screening
- Improvements in mental health care for women
- Decrease in breast cancer deaths
- Decrease in smoking rates for women
- Decrease in teen pregnancy
- Cervical cancer prevention and screening
- Decrease in HIV/AIDS deaths in women
- Federal funding to address violence against women
- Decrease in lung cancer deaths in women
- Mother-to-child transmission of HIV decreased
- Decrease in deaths from women's leading killer – heart disease
- Making birth control better, safer, and more accessible for women
- Creation of Offices on Women's Health at the federal level
- Cancer and Steroid Hormone (CASH) study
- Approval of emergency contraception
- Building better osteoporosis treatments
- Efforts to improve pregnant women's health and outcomes
- Dangerous drugs and devices for women removed from market
- Improvements in support to caregivers
- Improvements in older women's health
- Largest women's health prevention study ever – Women's Health Initiative
- FDA helps women and families meet their nutritional needs
- Addressing sex differences in health
- Addressing minority women's health
- Recognizing the needs of lesbian, bisexual, and transgender women
- Creation of women's health information resources
- Affordable Care Act improves women's health
- 30 Achievements in Women's Health in 30 Years (1984 – 2014)
- HHS and women's health: Agency and office descriptions
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- 30 Achievements in Women's Health in 30 Years (1984 – 2014)
- Largest women's health prevention study ever – Women's Health Initiative
- CDC, Leading Causes of Death in Females United States, 2010 (current listing)
- NIH, NCI, A Snapshot of Breast Cancer
- NIH, NCI, A Snapshot of Colorectal Cancer
- MedlinePlus, Osteoporosis - overview
- NIH, NHLBI, WHI Background and Overview
- NIH, NCI, Decrease in Breast Cancer Rates Related to Reduction in Use of Hormone Replacement Therapy
- FDA, Menopause and Hormones: Common Questions
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30 Achievements in Women's Health in 30 Years (1984 – 2014)
Call the OWH HELPLINE: 1-800-994-9662
9 a.m. — 6 p.m. ET, Monday — Friday
OWH and the OWH helpline do not see patients and are unable to: diagnose your medical condition; provide treatment; prescribe medication; or refer you to specialists. The OWH helpline is a resource line. The OWH helpline does not provide medical advice.
Please call 911 or go to the nearest emergency room if you are experiencing a medical emergency.Largest women's health prevention study ever – Women's Health Initiative
Some of the most common diseases that affect women after menopause are cardiovascular disease (the leading cause of death among U.S. women1), breast cancer (the second-leading cause of cancer deaths in U.S. women2), colorectal cancer (the third-leading cause of cancer death among U.S. women3), and osteoporosis (the leading cause of bone fracture in U.S. women4).
In 1991, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, part of NIH, launched the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) to understand better how these diseases affect post-menopausal women and to reduce the number of women who develop and die from these diseases. More than 160,000 post-menopausal women ages 50 to 79 participated in the 15-year study, making it one of the largest prevention studies involving women in the United States.5
WHI results in 2002 found that post-menopausal women taking combination (estrogen and progestin) hormone therapy for menopause symptoms had an increased risk for breast cancer, heart disease, stroke, blood clots, and urinary incontinence. Although women using combined hormone therapy had a lower risk of fractures and colorectal cancer, these benefits did not outweigh the risks. As a result, many women stopped taking hormone therapy, reducing their risk for breast cancer. One of the most important outcomes of the WHI was the sharp decline in breast cancer in 2003 after the WHI results were released in 2002.6 Today, the FDA urges women who take hormone therapy to take the lowest helpful dose for the shortest amount of time.7
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All material contained on these pages are free of copyright restrictions and may be copied, reproduced, or duplicated without permission of the Office on Women’s Health in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Citation of the source is appreciated.
Page last updated: May 17, 2019.
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A federal government website managed by the Office on Women's Health in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
200 Independence Avenue, S.W., Washington, DC 20201
1-800-994-9662 • Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. ET (closed on federal holidays).
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