The deadly profits of misogynist medicine

[babylonsister]

http://www.alternet.org/blogs/peek/#50838

The deadly profits of misogynist medicine
Posted by Guest Blogger on April 20, 2007 at 1:52 PM.

This is a guest post from Lucinda Marshall at the Feminist Peace Network.

The latest issue of Ms. Magazine has an unfortunate article (which unfortunately is not online) about the HPV vaccine. The gist of it is that the vaccine is good for women and anyone who opposes it (and they only acknowledge opposition that is based on fears that it will promote promiscuity) is anti-woman.

Nowhere is there any mention that there are concerns about both the effectiveness and safety of the vaccine that have not yet been fully addressed or that Merck, the company that manufactures the vaccine, has provided very significant funding to many of the legislators that are pushing the vaccine.

But that actually isn't what this post is about. This last week there was more confirmation that hormone replacement therapy is probably responsible for a significant percentage of breast, endometrial and ovarian cancer deaths during several decades.

According to the Washington Post, "An awful lot of breast cancer was caused by doctors' prescriptions," said Larry Norton of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York. "That's a very serious and sobering thought."

No kidding. And in the meantime, not only did the pharmaceutical companies make a financial killing selling HRT, but they also profited handsomely from selling "The Cure" in the form of chemotherapy drugs to treat the cancer they caused in the first place.

Not coincidentally, as I have written about previously, these companies also donate heavily to organizations such as the American Cancer Society and Susan G. Komen for the Cure, both of which wield enormous influence on cancer research and policy.

But it isn't just HRT prescriptions that are the culprit. For some time now there has been concern about the estrogen-mimicking pesticides that regularly make their way to our rivers and streams, and the estrogen from birth control pills that is literally pissed into our sewage and other toxins and pharmaceuticals that jeopardize our water supply. We also know that human male sperm counts are dropping and that there have been incidences of male fish and frogs taking on female attributes. Anyone want to connect the obvious dots here?

more...

[Maat]

1. I'm on birth control pills, and I think that it is the right course of action for me.

They got rid of an ovarian cyst that I had, saving me potentially dangerous surgery. People in my category using the hormones have a 55% lower risk of ovarian cancer than those who don't use the medicine, per every ob-gyn I've talked to. I witnessed fairly quickly getting rid of the cyst myself (via ultrasound imagery). I'm pre-menopausal. I'm told that things change post-menopause. And, I think that birth control pills (certain kinds) are a very good option for young women.

My point is that I would like to see every woman consult with medical professionals that she trusts, and make a decision. Few medicines should be automatically and totally vilified.

[babylonsister]

5. Ah, there's the rub. Many people don't have the luxury of consulting

with medical professionals 'they trust'. I have insurance, and a female doctor I was allowed to pick, but how many people don't have that? And I am involved in a major clinic with lots of docs who see hundreds, if not thousands, of people a day. I wonder about the quality of care, and I'm lucky I have this.

[Maat]

6. Yes, you have a point.

Actually, what happened to me is that I started having terrible symptoms (weeks of bleeding, etc.). I had a doctor try to tell me that there was a great chance it was cancer. It was only because I contacted my brother-in-law, a fundamentalist ob-gyn, ironically, that I became suspicious. The one doctor performed a DNC, and then wanted to perform additional surgery. My brother-in-law told me to march in there and tell him that I wanted to try non-surgical treatment (since it had worked on my sis when she was 17, etc.). Furthermore, my brother-in-law told me to run, not walk, out of his office. I did, and cried to my friend, a pediatrician, who got me into the wonderful doctor THAT DAY. Needless to say, things went swimmingly after that, after I went through a life crisis for two months, during which I questioned everything I had done in my life, thinking I was dying. So, those pills saved me from unbelievable problems.

The doctor who wanted to do the multi-thousand-dollar second procedure on me - well, he then sued me in small claims court for five thousand dollars, and refused to bill my insurance company, lying and stating that I had told him that I'd pay him in cash. Believe or not, the insurance company came through. Because of my law degree (I'm not a practicing attorney)(I'm in real estate investments), I knew to get to the risk management department. They wrote me a letter, and that backed me up in court, and the doctor was ordered to bill my insurance company.

Bottom line ... I'm very lucky to have the honest, caring ob-gyn that I have now.

[azurnoir]

2. What I do not understand is

why anyone would believe 1 womens info coming originally out of the Bush run health department or what WaPo says some MD said.
At the time of the release of the 2002 study there was an addendum to the study called "What this means to the individual" the numbers were stated to the public in the sensational way possible a27% increase in breast was screaming from the headlines, for most I suspect it meant 27 out of 100 women on HRT were going to get breast cancer, the truth out of 2 groups of women both groups consisting of 3500 women each one group on HRT and one group not on HRT . In the group that was on HRT 4 women developed breast cancer while in the group that was not 3 did , not quite so sensational. Now what is even stranger is that a similar study done 5 years earlier had shown the opposite results. The first study however was done on women who were already on HRT the second was done with women who were post menopausal (some by as much as 10 years) who had never been on HRT and started it for the study.
When the original was released I was working in an OB/GYN office and yes there was a panic, what doctors there did was to show women all the facts and let them decide for themselves, the one exception being if they had a strong maternal family history of breast cancer but that factor was always considered in the decision to start HRT. Before anyone gets going about Doctors taking kickbacks from pharma for HRT sales it is BS most clinics do not allow such things and if the pharm reps were truly trying to push anything it was anti-depressants such as Paxil, Zoloft and the ever popular Celexa. Most of the doctors in that clinic did not feel they were qualified to manger anti-depressant therapy so they declined.
What is really perplexing is that some people here want them HRT removed from the market in one breath but will proclaim that women should have the right to make their own health decisions with the next. Whether to start HRT or not and weighing the risks is a health decision not a political issue.

[Maat]

3. Bingo.

I'm always suspicious (being 48) of bad news about hormones, because the negative things tend to come out during conservative times when there is a strong desire by some for women to have no options at all. So, I do extensive research.

:tinfoilhat:

[azurnoir]

4. More on medicine not HRT

There are issues in womens medicine that are not discussed or rarely, one would be the unusually high number of hysterectomies among relatively young women, especially poor women. I could use myself as an example I was 42 when I was diagnosed with a growth on my left ovary, a CAT scan was done and an ultrasound, both showed a mass that occluded my left ovary, strangely the mass had no visiblre blood supply (should have been my first clue) I had just graduated from school as a CMA and had no experience so I went with what I was told. Prior to surgery an endometrial biopsy and complete exam including Pap and STD screen was done. I was told that all was normal but that the mass was dangerous so I allowed the surgery. It was 3 day after the surgery before I saw the Doctor who told me that they had removed my left andright ovary and my uterus and cervix the 3 latter items were done as "cancer prevention" As time passed and got a bit more knowledge I grew curious, also the mass was back, turned out to be scar tissue from a c-section. I obtained copies of my records from the hospital- there was no actual operative report which by law there has to be just a pathology report on each of my ovaries, both consisted of three words "normal benign ovary", I was on Medical Assistance at the time of surgery so I called the state to see if they had the report , the women I talked to pulled my records and no there was not an operative report, just a hand written note from the MD stating that I had endometriosis, advanced HPV, and odd growths on my ovaries necessitating surgery, stunned I asked her if there were lab reports having been tested for all the above and being told all was normal, sure enough the lab reports were there and showed nothing of what the doctor had stated in the letter, the lab reports BTW were dated for a few days before the letter. I asked the women what was going on she replied "they do this all the time i am not surprised" I asked if this did not constitute welfare fraud on the part of the medical facility at the least she yes but......
my point here is that I have met many more women with very similar stories and actually worse, the hospital is a teaching facility and it is my belief that poor women are being used as "practice" for the residents which my doctor was. This practice involves sterilization and to me is a new twist on the Alabama appendectomy.