On this episode of Innovate & Elevate, Sharon sits down with Dr. Corinne Menn, an OB-GYN, menopause specialist, and breast cancer survivor, to unpack one of the most misunderstood topics in women’s health: the relationship between breast cancer risk and hormone therapy. Recorded eight days after the FDA announced it will remove the long-standing black box language on hormone therapy, this conversation traces the legacy of the 2002 Women’s Health Initiative press conference, what the data actually showed, and how modern evidence can better guide women and their clinicians today.

What You’ll Learn from this Episode:

• What really happened in July 2002, and why the WHI press conference (held eight days before doctors saw the full study) reshaped hormone therapy for a generation.
• The difference between estrogen alone and combined estrogen–progestin therapy, and why age, timing, and formulation matter.
• Why every major professional society (ASCO, ACOG, American Urological Association, The Menopause Society) agrees that local, low-dose vaginal hormones do not increase breast cancer risk, recurrence, or mortality.
• The role of tools like the Tyrer–Cuzick breast cancer risk model in understanding your baseline risk - and how Dr. Menn interprets those results in the context of HRT.
• Dr. Menn’s own story: being diagnosed with ER/PR-positive breast cancer at 28 during OB-GYN residency, going through abrupt menopause, and later discovering a BRCA2 mutation after updated genetic testing
• How she now counsels breast cancer survivors about menopause, quality of life, and when hormone therapy may or may not be appropriate
• Practical ways women can prepare for a time-limited doctor’s visit to have more informed, individualized conversations about breast cancer risk and hormone therapy

As always, nothing in this episode is personal medical advice. Please talk with your own clinician about your individual history, risks, and options.

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Connect with Dr. Corinne Menn:

• On LinkedIn
• On Instagram
• Learn more on her website

Breast Cancer Risk Models & Screening Tools:

Tyrer–Cuzick (IBIS) Breast Cancer Risk Model - https://ems-trials.org/riskevaluator/

Gail Model (Breast Cancer Risk Assessment Tool) - https://bcrisktool.cancer.gov

POSITIVE Trial – New England Journal of Medicine - https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2215851

Hormone Therapy, Menopause Guidelines & Professional...