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Preventive Nutrition pp 337–370Cite as

The Women's Health Initiative: Lessons for Preventive Nutrition

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Part of the book series: Nutrition and Health ((NH))

Abstract

Toward the end of the 1980s, considerable evidence was accumulating from observational studies and some short-term trials with nondisease endpoints that identified factors that might benefit women in their postmenopausal years. The balance of randomized trials prior to that point had been focused on men and men’s health. The confluence of scientific discovery and political will led to the design and ultimate funding of what was to be known as the Women’s Health Initiative (WHI). Two main factors in this category were hormone replacement therapy (hormone therapy), suggested to prevent cardiovascular disease, the number one cause of death among women, and total dietary fat reduction for purposes of reducing risk for breast and colorectal cancers, also major causes of death and disability among women. These became the two, overlapping, main trials that were the core of WHI.

Key Points

• The Women’s Health Initiative (WHI) is the largest primary prevention study of diet ever undertaken among postmenopausal women in the United States.

• Postmenopausal women represent a subpopulation with unique health issues and variable diet and nutrition influences on health status.

• Excess body weight is a significant health risk for cardiovascular disease, breast cancer, colorectal cancer, and type 2 diabetes in postmenopausal women.

• The diet intervention aimed at reducing total fat to 20% of kilocalories was not associated with reduced risk for breast or colorectal cancer. Likewise, neither cardiovascular disease nor diabetes was significantly reduced in the WHI Diet Modification study population. Those who reported the highest dietary fat intake at baseline or reported the greatest reduction in dietary fat showed trends toward reduced risk for several of these chronic diseases.

• Supplementation with calcium and vitamin D did not reduce risk for colorectal cancer nor was it associated with a significant reduction in fracture risk, although women with lower baseline serum vitamin D levels did have some protection against fractures with combined calcium and vitamin D supplementation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Nutritional Sciences, Public health and Medicine, University of Arizona, 85721-0038, Tucson, AZ, USA

    Cynthia A. Thomson PHD, RD

  2. Department of Epidemiology, University of Washington, Seattle, 98199, Washington, DC, USA

    Shirley A.A. Beresford PHD

  3. Department of Family and Community Medicine and Nutritional Sciences, University of Arizona, 85721-0038, Tucson, AZ, USA

    Cheryl Ritenbaugh PHD, MPH

Authors
  1. Cynthia A. Thomson PHD, RD
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  2. Shirley A.A. Beresford PHD
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  3. Cheryl Ritenbaugh PHD, MPH
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Correspondence to Cynthia A. Thomson PHD, RD .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. New Products Research, GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare, Littleton Road 1500 , Parsippany, 07054, U.S.A.

    Adrianne Bendich

  2. Inst. Human Nutrition, Columbia University, West 168th St. 630 , New York, 10032, U.S.A.

    Richard J. Deckelbaum

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Thomson, C.A., Beresford, S.A., Ritenbaugh, C. (2010). The Women's Health Initiative: Lessons for Preventive Nutrition. In: Bendich, A., Deckelbaum, R. (eds) Preventive Nutrition. Nutrition and Health. Humana Press. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-60327-542-2_14

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