Hormone Therapy Use Has Nearly Doubled. Now Women Can’t Find the Patches.
Quick Breakdown · Menopause
Menopausal hormone therapy use has nearly doubled since 2017, according to new data from Epic Research analyzing records from more than 163 million women. Use climbed from 1.7% to 3.6% between 2017 and 2026. Among women ages 45 to 54, it almost tripled.
The acceleration is recent. Use held essentially flat through 2022, then began climbing sharply in 2023. Updated research had softened the risk picture around estrogen, and last November the FDA moved to strip the decades-old black-box warning from estrogen products. Women and their doctors noticed. Patches and gels led the growth.
Here is the problem: the supply chain did not prepare for any of this.
Pharmacies in the Pittsburgh area have been reporting estradiol patch shortages stretching six to eight months. Women are driving 40 minutes to fill a prescription.
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Pharmacies in the Pittsburgh area have been reporting estradiol patch shortages stretching six to eight months. Women are driving 40 minutes to fill a prescription. Pharmacies are paying double the standard price when stock appears at all. The FDA says the situation has not reached the threshold for a declared national shortage. That determination has done little to help the women being switched to gels or alternate doses they did not choose.
The timing is not coincidental. Patches and gels were exactly the formulations that grew fastest as the evidence base improved and more women sought care. Demand surged in the precise product categories least prepared for it.
Not every woman is a candidate for hormone therapy, and the clinical picture is still evolving. But for those who are on a regimen that works, being redirected to a different formulation because the one they use is simply unavailable is not a minor inconvenience. It is a barrier that compounds years of underdiagnosed and undertreated menopause care.
Source: Epic Research