TIBOLONE (LIVIAL)

Report #6993; 1/6/97

Some women won't take the female hormone, estrogen after the menopause because they think that it increases their chances of developing breast cancer (1). Exciting new studies show that a male-like hormone, called tibolone, may give all the benefits of estrogen while lowering blood levels of estrogen and not increasing her chances of developing breast or uterine cancer (2,3).

Estrogen strengthens bones and prevents heart attacks, strokes, hot flushes, vaginal dryness, loss of height, lowered I.Q., Alzheimer's disease, depression, anxiety, loss of teeth, osteoarthritis and colon cancer (4,5). Recent data show that the male-like hormone, tibolone, prevents hot flushes, anxiety, depression and lowered I.Q. (2,10), markedly increases a woman's interst in making love (9) and strengthen bones more than the female hormone, estrogen, does (3,8). You would expect this because male hormones cause men to have much larger bones anyway.

Women with low blood levels of male hormones have little interest in making love. A recent report in the medical journal, Fertility and Sterility, shows that blood levels of male hormones drop significantly after the menopause (6). Male-like hormones, such a tibolone, can perk a woman's sagging sexual drive. Tibolone has been prescribed in Europe for more than 8 years, although it not been approved for use in the United States. The only concern that has shown up so far is that, like testosterone, it lowers blood levels of the good HDL cholesterol which may increase a susceptible woman's chances of suffering a heart attack. However, most studies show that this lowering is extremely small (7).

By Gabe Mirkin, M.D., for CBS Radio News