Intensive instruction in BSE did not reduce mortality from breast cancer. Programs to encourage BSE in the absence of mammography would be unlikely to reduce mortality from breast cancer. Women who choose to practice BSE should be informed that its efficacy is unproven and that it may increase their chances of having a benign breast biopsy.

Background The association between and vitamin D levels and fractures is uncertain. Objective To test the hypothesis that serum 25-hydroxyVitamin D (25(OH) vitamin D) levels are associated with the risk of hip fracture in community dwelling women. Design Nested case-control study. Setting 40 US clinical centers. Participants We studied 400 cases of incident hip fractures and 400 controls matched on age, race/ethnicity and date of blood draw (average follow-up time, 7.1 years). Subjects were selected from 39,795 postmenopausal women without previous hip fractures, not using estrogens or other bone-active therapies. Measurements Serum 25(OH) vitamin D was measured on baseline serum using radioimmunoassay with DiaSorin reagents and divided into quartiles. Conditional logistic regression was used to estimate the odds ratio with 95% confidence intervals (CI). Multivariable models included age, body mass index, parental and personal history of fractures, smoking, alcohol and calcium intake, geographic location and corticosteroid use. Results The mean (standard deviation, SD) 25(OH) vitamin D (nM) was lower in cases, 56.2(20.3) compared to controls, 59.7(18), p=0.007. A 25 nM (10ng/ml) decrease in 25(OH) vitamin D was associated with a 33% increased risk of hip fracture (odds ratio=1.33; 95%CI,1.06, 1.68) in multivariable models. Compared to women with 25(OH) vitamin D ≥70.7 nM (Quartile 4), the odds ratio of hip fracture was 1.71 (1.05, 2.79), 1.09 (0.70, 1.71) and 0.82 (0.51, 1.31) in women with 25(OH) vitamin D <47.5 nM, 47.5 to 60 nM, 60 to <70 nM, respectively, p trend =0.015. This association was in part mediated by a marker of bone resorption but remained statistically significant. Adjustment for falls, physical function, frailty, renal function, or sex steroid hormones had no effect on this association. Limitations No measure of bone density. Conclusion Low serum 25(OH) vitamin D concentrations are associated with a higher risk of hip fracture. Measurement of 25(OH) vitamin D may be useful in identifying women at high risk of hip fracture.

IMPORTANCE Considerable efforts have been undertaken to relate single nutrients to bone health. To this point, results are inconsistent. Suboptimal single nutrient intake does not occur in isolation but rather reflects a poor diet quality. OBJECTIVE To assess the association between adherence to a diet quality index constructed on the basis of dietary recommendations or existing healthy dietary patterns and fractures in postmenopausal women. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS Post hoc analysis was conducted of longitudinal data from 40 clinical centers throughout the United States included in the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) observational study. Participants in the prospective cohort included 93 676 women who were eligible for the WHI if they were aged 50 to 79 years. Recruitment was conducted from October 1, 1993, to December 31, 1998, with the study ending August 29, 2014. The WHI food frequency questionnaire was used to derive nutrient and food intake at baseline. Diet quality and adherence were assessed by scores on the alternate Mediterranean Diet (aMED), a 9-category measure of adherence to a Mediterranean dietary pattern; the Healthy Eating Index 2010 (HEI-2010), a 100-point measure of 12 food components; the 11-item Alternate Healthy Eating Index 2010 (AHEI-2010); or the 8-component Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet score. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES Outcome measures included incident total and hip fractures. Hazard ratios (HRs) by quintiles of dietary index scores were estimated using Cox proportional hazards regression analyses. RESULTS Of the 93 676 participants, 90 014 were included in the analysis (mean [SD] age, 63.6 [7.4]) years. During a median follow-up time of 15.9 years, there were 2121 cases of hip fractures and 28 718 cases of total fractures. Women scoring in the highest quintile (Q5) of the aMED index had a lower risk for hip fractures (HR, 0.80; 95% CI, 0.66-0.97), with an absolute risk reduction of 0.29% and a number needed to treat of 342 (95% CI, 249-502). No association between the aMED score and total fractures was observed (Q5 HR, 1.01; 95% CI, 0.95-1.07). Higher HEI-2010 or DASH scores tended to be inversely related to hip fracture risk, but the results were nonsignificant (Q5 HR, 0.87; 95% CI, 0.75-1.02; and Q5 HR, 0.89; 95% CI, 0.75-1.06, respectively). The AHEI-2010 score was associated with neither hip nor total fractures. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE Higher adherence to a Mediterranean diet is associated with a lower risk for hip fractures. These results support that a healthy dietary pattern may play a role in maintaining bone health in postmenopausal women.

Objective-Emerging evidence suggests that women with menopausal vasomotor symptoms (VMS) have increased cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk as measured by surrogate markers. We investigated the relationships between VMS and clinical CVD events and all-cause mortality in the Women's Health Initiative Observational Study (WHI-OS).* Corresponding author and address reprint requests to: Emily D. Szmuilowicz, MD, MS Division of Endocrinology, Metabolism and Molecular Medicine, Northwestern University 211 E. Chicago Ave., #1050 Chicago, IL 60611 edszmuilowicz@post.harvard.edu Phone: (312) 944-6677 x318, fax: (312) 944-3346. Financial disclosure/conflicts of interest Dr. Szmuilowicz reported that she was previously a sub-investigator in a clinical trial of a diabetes treatment (GLP-1 agonist) sponsored by Sanofi-aventis, and she received no financial compensation. Dr. Seely reported that she received a Bayer Health Care investigator-initiated grant. Dr. Howard reports: consultant for Merck/Schering-Plough; research support from donation of drugs from Merck/Shering-Plough; lectures for Merck/Schering-Plough. None of the other authors reported financial disclosures. This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early version of the manuscript. The manuscript will undergo copyediting, typesetting, and review of the resulting proof before it is published in its final citable form. Please note that during the production process errors may be discovered which could affect the content, and all legal disclaimers that apply to the journal pertain. NIH Public Access Author ManuscriptMenopause. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2012 June 1. Conclusions-Early VMS were not associated with increased CVD risk. Rather, early VMS were associated with decreased risk of stroke, total CVD events, and all-cause mortality. Late VMS were associated with increased CHD risk and all-cause mortality. The predictive value of VMS for clinical CVD events may vary with onset of VMS at different stages of menopause.Further research examining the mechanisms underlying these associations is needed. Future studies will also be necessary to investigate whether VMS that develop for the first time in the later postmenopausal years represent a pathophysiologic process distinct from classical perimenopausal VMS.

http://www.clinicaltrials.gov. Unique identifier: NCT00685009 and NCT00745056.

Background Data on the association between dietary patterns and age-related cognitive decline are inconsistent. Objective To determine whether dietary patterns assessed by the alternate Mediterranean diet score (aMED), the Healthy Eating Index (HEI) 2010, the Alternate Healthy Eating Index (AHEI) 2010 or the Dietary Approach to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet score are associated with cognitive decline in older women. To examine if dietary patterns modify the risk for cognitive decline in hypertensive women. Design Prospective, longitudinal cohort study. Food frequency questionnaires (FFQs) were used to derive dietary patterns at baseline. Hypertension was defined as self-report of current drug therapy for hypertension or clinic measurement of SBP ≥ 140mmHg or DBP ≥ 90mmHg. Participants/setting Postmenopausal women (N=6,425) aged 65 to 79 years who participated in the Women’s Health Initiative Memory Study (WHIMS) and were cognitively intact at baseline. Main Outcome Measures Cognitive decline was defined as cases of mild cognitive impairment (MCI) or probable dementia (PD). Cases were identified through rigorous screening and expert adjudication. Statistical Analyses performed Cox proportional hazards models with multivariable adjustment were used to estimate the relative risk for developing MCI or PD. Results During a median follow-up of 9.11 years, we documented 499 cases of MCI and 390 of PD. In multivariable analyses we did not detect any statistically significant relationships across quintiles of aMED, HEI-2010, DASH and AHEI-2010 scores and MCI or PD (ptrend=0.30, 0.44, 0.23 and 0.45). In hypertensive women we found no significant association between dietary patterns and cognitive decline (ptrend=0.19, 0.08, 0.07 and 0.60). Conclusions Dietary patterns characterized by the aMED, HEI-2010, AHEI-2010 or DASH dietary score were not associated with cognitive decline in older women. Adherence to a healthy dietary pattern did not modify the risk for cognitive decline in hypertensive women.

Community-dwelling middle-aged and older women who reported prior-year physical, verbal, or both types of abuse had significantly higher adjusted mortality risk than women who did not report abuse. These findings highlight the need for longitudinal research into prevention of abuse in later life and accompanying excess mortality and emphasize the importance of abuse prevention in later life.

This study was conducted to identify reproductive and dietary factors associated with benign proliferative mammary epithelial cell changes. Subjects were women enrolled in a randomized trial of breast self-examination in Shanghai, China. Women who developed fibrocystic breast conditions classified as nonproliferative (175 women), proliferative (181 women), or proliferative with atypia (33 women) between 1995 and 2000 and 1,070 unaffected trial participants were administered general risk factor and food frequency questionnaires. Conditional logistic regression was used to estimate adjusted odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals. High parity and consumption of fresh fruits and vegetables were more strongly associated with a reduced risk of proliferative and atypical lesions than with nonproliferative conditions. For the fourth quartile of consumption versus the first, odds ratios for lesions diagnosed as nonproliferative, proliferative, and proliferative with atypia were 0.4 (95% confidence interval (CI): 0.2, 0.7), 0.2 (95% CI: 0.1, 0.4), and 0.1 (95% CI: 0.03, 0.5), respectively, for fruit intake and 0.6 (95% CI: 0.3, 1.1), 0.4 (95% CI: 0.2, 0.7), and 0.1 (95% CI: 0.1, 0.9), respectively, for vegetable intake. Reduced but nonsignificant risks in relation to soy products were observed for proliferative and atypical lesions. No single nutrient or botanical family was appreciably more strongly associated with proliferative conditions than with nonproliferative conditions, after results were controlled for total fruit and vegetable consumption. A diet rich in fruits and vegetables may reduce cellular proliferation in the mammary epithelium; this is one mechanism by which such a diet could reduce risk of breast cancer.