Attitudes Toward Postmenopausal Long-Term Hormone Therapy

Abstract

In this article we address the question of why postmenopausal women undergo hormone therapy. Thirty-five women aged 46 to 75 years living in Bremen (Germany) and taking postmenopausal hormones for at least 12 months were interviewed. Following Fritz Schütze, the interviews were analyzed according to a reconstructive analytical procedure. Five different types of users were identified. They differed from each other in terms of their reasons for using hormones, their expectations of this type of therapy, and their personal habits and circumstances, including an integrity-preserving attitude, a performance-oriented attitude, a searching attitude, a faith-in-medicine attitude, and a benefit-generalizing attitude. The interviews show that there is a need for target-oriented counseling, taking into account the individual attitudes toward menopause and postmenopausal hormone therapy.

Knowledge, Perceptions and Information about Hormone Therapy (HT) among Menopausal Women: A Systematic Review and Meta-Synthesis

“…There was good (κ = 0.64) agreement between MFT and YCT on choosing the final 77 applicable full-text studies for potential inclusion. Of these studies, 40 were excluded for various reasons, leaving 37 studies [5], [7], [28], [29], [30], [31], [32], [33], [34], [35], [36], [37], [38], [39], [40], [41], [42], [43], [44], [45], [46], [47], [48], [49], [50], [51], [52], [53], [54], [55], [56], [57], [58], [59], [60], [61], [62] included in our analyses (See figure 1). …”

Erwünscht, ungewohnt und kommunikationsbedürftig – Die evidenzbasierte Entscheidungshilfe des Instituts für Qualität und Wirtschaftlichkeit im Gesundheitswesen (IQWiG)

“…Mit dem ,,Spezial Wechseljahre'' hat das IQWiG eine solche Thematik aufgegriffen. Die Notwendigkeit der Zusammenstellung der aktuellen wissenschaftlichen Evidenz zum Ablauf der Wechseljahre und zu Möglichkeiten des Umgangs mit Beschwerden, die in diesem Zusammenhang auftreten, wurde vor allem aus Untersuchungen abgeleitet, die belegten, dass nach wie vor abseits der wissenschaftlich abgesicherten Indikationen und Verordnungszeiträume Hormone verschrieben werden -vielfach ohne eine angemessene Aufklärung über die Risiken der Therapie [2,3]. Darüber hinaus gibt es für informationssuchende Frauen kaum Anlaufstellen, bei denen sie unabhängige, wissenschaftsbasierte Informationen über die Hormontherapie und mögliche Alternativen bekommen kön-nen.…”

Situating and Constructing Diversity in Semi-Structured Interviews

“…Descriptive/divergent SSIs have been used to investigate such topics as women’s attitudes toward technology (resistant versus flexible) and their childbirth experiences (Kornelson, 2005), women’s attitudes toward postmenopausal long-term hormone therapy (five different types of users were identified who differed from each other in terms of their reasons for using hormones, their expectations of this type of therapy, and their personal habits and circumstances; Kolip, Hoefling-Engels, & Schmacke, 2009), elite women wrestlers’ muscles (senior wrestlers accepted the “athletic body” and muscularity with its social costs; junior wrestlers were “holding back” giving priority to the “private body”; Sisjord & Kristiansen, 2009), and lesbian versus gay activists’ attitudes toward transgender inclusion (Stone, 2009). …”