Effects of hormone replacement therapy on cardiovascular responses in postmenopausal women with and without type 2 diabetes.

Objective: To determine whether blood pressure (BP) responses to pressor stimuli during hormone replacement therapy are reduced by oral conjugated equine estrogens 0.625 mg/day (ERT) and ERT in combination with 5 mg/day continuous medroxyprogesterone (HRT) in women with and without type 2 diabetes.

Methods: Twenty type 2 diabetic and 20 non-diabetic women completed a three period, randomised, double bind crossover studying the effects of 1 month of therapy of ERT, HRT and placebo on BP responses to mental arithmetic and isometric stress and to intravenous infusions of noradrenaline and angiotensin II.