Dr. Robert Hoover, director of NCI’s Epidemiology and Biostatistics Programme, discusses a new study of diethylstilbestrol (DES), a drug once prescribed to pregnant women. Dr. Hoover describes the history behind DES and the long-term health effects that are now known to be associated with prenatal exposure to the drug. A written article about the study appears in the NCI DES follow-up study.
Not just public health books but real stories of a tragedy experienced by million of men and women…
DES Books
The Flickr “DES Books” photo set features front cover images of a selection of books and publications in English and French about the adverse effects of Diethylstilbestrol, the synthetic oestrogen prescribed to millions of pregnant women around the world decades ago in the mistaken belief that it would reduce the risk of complications during pregnancy. Below is a short introduction presenting these books:
In this gripping exploration, Nancy Langston shows how these chemicals have penetrated into every aspect of our bodies and ecosystems, yet the U.S. government has largely failed to regulate them and has skillfully manipulated scientific uncertainty to delay regulation. Personally affected by endocrine disruptors, Langston argues that the FDA needs to institute proper regulation of these commonly produced synthetic chemicals.
AFSSAPS DES Report – Author French Agency for the Safety of Health Products (AFSSAPS), published in 2011
As a result of a survey conducted in 2010, AFSSAPS decided to publish a DES update aimed at DES exposed individuals and health professionals. The publication emphasizes the gynecologists and obstetricians’ crucial role in recognizing DES exposure, informing their patients about its consequences and referring them to specialists for adequate care and monitoring. It also highlights the crucial role of DES patients in handing down the “record” of their exposure to the next generations. The AFSSAPS report is available to download in English and French.
The book’s most chilling section involves the tragic results of thalidomide and diethylstilbestrol (DES), two drugs from the 1950s that were “given to pregnant women in the belief that the fetus would be unaffected.” Ms. Paul reveals six decades later: “It is evidence of the evolving state of our knowledge that the mechanisms by which these substances do their damage are not completely clear, even now.”
DES Voices, From Anger to Action – Author Pat Val Cody, published in 2008.
“Take a new estrogen promoted by the pharmaceutical companies. Add doctors ready to believe in another miracle drug. Take post-World War II women desperate to have a baby after miscarrying. Continue prescription for years. The result is the tragedy experienced by million of DES-exposed mothers, daughters, and son – and perhaps grandchildren. This is the story of what they did about the drug disaster that changed their lives.”
DES Stories, Faces and Voices of People Exposed to Diethylstilbestrol – Author Margaret Lee Braun, Theo Colborn and Nancy M.Stuart, first published in 2001
A tribute to the millions of lives upended by exposure to DES, diethylstilbestrol, synthetic estrogen, toxic chemical, and carcinogenic prescription drug. In photographic portraits and interviews, DES daughters, mothers, and sons tell, in their own voice, what it’s like to be DES-exposed. Today the DES story continues to unfold as research brings new findings to light. DES Stories rings with daring honesty—and points to broader concerns about the effects of endocrine-disrupting chemicals.
In this important book, Drs. Apfel and Fisher demonstrate how explosive technological advances, physicians’ unconscious fantasies of heroism, and the urging of patients, among other factors, combined to produce the DES disaster-a massive tragedy that could occur again in any area of medicine.
“An important contribution to the understanding of the uses of DES by pregnant women and the risks associated with this use. It is the only book on this subject that provides a scientifically objective overview and should be read by all who are involved in the debate over the effects of in utero DES exposure, including those men and women who were unfortunately exposed to the drug” American Medical Writers Association, July 1987.
On estime le nombre de victimes du DES à 360 000 en France. Préfacé par Marie Darrieussecq, marraine du Réseau D.E.S. France, ce livre donne la parole aux femmes et aux hommes – mères et pères, filles et fils, compagnons – qui vivent les douloureuses conséquences de ce scandale médical, pour faire entendre leur souffrance et leur colère
Stéphanie Chevallier est présidente de l’association des “Filles DES”. Elle est aujourd’hui l’heureuse maman d’un petit garçon adopté au Vietnam et poursuit son combat au nom des victimes du Distilbène grâce à son important rayonnement médiatique (elle est apparue dans Libération, Le Monde, etc…). Ce livre est son histoire et son combat contre l’ignorance face au DES.
Cet ouvrage est le fruit de la collaboration de plusieurs experts reconnus pour leur compétence dans ce domaine. Il intéressera tous les gynécologues obstétriciens, les urologues, mais aussi les médecins de santé publique et les sages-femmes.
Ce livre est le récit poignant d’une mère qui, sans le savoir, attend un « bébé Distilbène », du nom de ce médicament que l’on a donné aux femmes contre les nausées. Or, les filles des mères « contaminées » ont une propension aux fausse-couches et à d’autres pathologies. A partir de ce drame, Anne-Françoise Lof écrit un récit poignant dont le point de départ est la « non-existence » de l’enfant qui n’étant pas né, ni déclaré civilement, est tout de même né, même s’il était mort, une vraie personne, avec un vrai deuil, un vrai enterrement, une vraie souffrance. Elle s’appelait Saskia.
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Covering DiEthylStilbestrol worldwide drug disaster
Over the past few days, there has been an unprecedented flurry of media attention on DES related health issues. This come after a long-awaited DES study was published on October 06th in the New England Journal of Medicine (MEJM) which carefully documents elevated risk for women exposed to diethylstilbestrol (DES in short) for a host of medical problems including cancer, infertility, ectopic pregnancies, preterm labour, …. As yet, there has been no coverage from the UK press despite a call on UK journalists to make this information available to the public.
DES prescribed to women in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s to prevent miscarriages, had serious, untoward effects in daughters of these women, including the development of a rare type of cancer of the uterus. There has been renewed interest in light of a recent report in the New England Journal of Medicine documenting lifelong health complications facing daughters of women given DES.
Reproductive tissues are not the only targets of DES. The immune system is also known to be a target for estrogens. Dr. S. Ansar Ahmed, professor of immunology at Virginia Tech, led a National Institutes of Health study in the 1990s on how exposure to DES in utero affects the immune system later in life using a mouse model.
A drug that millions of pregnant women took decades ago to prevent miscarriage and complications has put their daughters at higher risk for breast cancer and other health problems that are showing up now, a new federal study finds.
A drug that millions of pregnant women took decades ago to prevent miscarriage and complications has put their daughters at higher risk for breast cancer and other health problems that are showing up now, a new U.S. federal study finds.
A woman given the anti-miscarriage drug diethylstilbestrol supports a call for a government-backed education campaign to highlight the dangers of exposure to the medication
In a follow-up to the DES drug disaster, researchers (including one of the authors of the original reports in the early 1970s) have examined reproductive health in a large cohort of women exposed to DES in utero. Their results were published last week in the New England Journal of Medicine, and they show that the health effects apparently continue beyond the reproductive years
The DES breast cancer lawsuit, together with a bombshell New England Journal of Medicine article published yesterday — which suggests that infertility is twice as common and that breast cancer risk is nearly doubled in “DES daughters” — has ushered in a new awareness of the drug after decades when its lingering effects went under the radar.
A large study of the daughters of women who had been given DES, the first synthetic form of estrogen, during pregnancy has found that exposure to the drug while in the womb (in utero) is associated with many reproductive problems and an increased risk of certain cancers and pre-cancerous conditions.
Beginning in 1940, diethylstilbestrol, known as DES, was used clinically to prevent certain complications of pregnancy. In the 1950s, clinical studies showed DES was ineffective for this purpose. In the late 1960s, an unusual occurrence of a rare …
Back in the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s, doctors prescribed a hormone called diethylstilbestrol, or DES, to millions of pregnant women in the unfounded belief it could prevent miscarriages. Smack in the middle of this period, the deformed thalidomide babies …
Diethylstilbestrol was prescribed in the mistaken belief it could reduce pregnancy complications, but the daughters of the women who took it are still living with its effects …
Women who were exposed in utero to diethylstilbestrol have a higher lifetime risk for several adverse health outcomes, according to a study published in the Oct. 6 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. …
In-utero exposure to diethylstilbestrol was associated with a high lifetime risk of a broad spectrum of adverse outcomes in a follow-up study of patients now in their 40s, 50s, and 60s, according to a report in the Oct. 6 issue of the New England …
Explain that the teratogenic effects of diethylstilbestrol have continued to exact a heavy toll throughout the lifetime of women who were exposed to the drug in utero. Point out that DES-exposed women …
The daughters of women given diethylstilbestrol (DES), a drug commonly used decades ago to prevent miscarriages and birth defects, are showing high rates of breast cancer and infertility problems, according to recent research. …
Millions of women alive today were exposed to a chemical called DES – diethylstilbestrol – in their mother’s uterus. The chemical, an early synthetic estrogen, was administered to some pregnant women before 1971 to help reduce risk of miscarriages and …
Washington, Sept 06 (ANI): Daughters of women who took a synthetic estrogen called diethylstilbestrol (DES) while pregnant decades ago are now facing a greater chance of being infertile and developing cancer, according to a large study by the National …
The study in Thursday’s New England Journal of Medicine examines the daughters of females exposed in the womb to diethylstilbestrol (DES), which was prescribed in the mistaken belief it could reduce certain complications of pregnancy. …
by macleans.ca on Thursday, October 6, 2011 12:56pm – 0 Comments DES (or diethylstilbestrol), an anti-miscarriage drug widely used between 1940 and 1970, has been linked to health problems—including breast cancer, infertility, difficult pregnancies and …
DES or diethylstilbestrol have been prescribed to pregnant women for the belief that it will reduce complications during pregnancy. The National Cancer Institute researchers and scientists have been following about 6500 women including those exposed to …
Women whose mothers were given the drug diethylstilbestrol (DES) during pregnancy are at increased risk for fertility problems and cancer as they age, new research shows. This study from the US National Cancer …
A study published by the New England Journal of Medicine on Thursday found daughters of women who took diethylstilbestrol (DES) while pregnant face a greater chance of being infertile and developing a rare vaginal cancer. …
A study appearing in Thursday’s New England Journal of Medicine examines women exposed in the womb to diethylstilbestrol (DES), which was prescribed in the mistaken belief it could reduce certain complications of pregnancy. Researchers at the National …
A comprehensive study looking at the drug diethylstilbestrol (DES) that was widely used by pregnant women in Europe and the United States to prevent problems in pregnancy such as miscarriage and premature birth from the 1940s until the 1960s suggests …
The Associated Press reports that the drug, an artificial form of estrogen called DES (diethylstilbestrol), was often prescribed to pregnant women in pill or cream form between 1940 and 1960. When it was discovered that the teenage daughters of women …
That drug was DES, or diethylstilbestrol, which was widely prescribed in the US beginning in 1940 to help stave off miscarriage — until 1971, when the US Food and Drug Administration decided that the drug doesn’t work and that it causes cancer. …
Diethylstilbestrol, or DES, widely was used in the United States, Europe and elsewhere from the 1940s through the 1960s to prevent miscarriage, premature birth, bleeding and other problems. Many companies made it as pills and creams. …
DES, or diethylstilbestrol, was widely used in the United States, Europe and elsewhere from the 1940s through the 1960s to prevent miscarriage, premature birth, bleeding and other problems. Many companies made and sold it as pills, creams and other …
Daughters of women who took a synthetic estrogen called diethylstilbestrol (DES) while pregnant decades ago are now facing a greater chance of being infertile and developing cancer, according to a large study by the National Cancer Institute in the …
Risks for other health problems vary. DES, or diethylstilbestrol, was widely used in the United States, Europe and elsewhere from the 1940s through the 1960s to prevent miscarriage, premature birth, bleeding and other problems.
AP A drug that millions of pregnant women took decades ago to prevent miscarriage and complications has put their daughters at higher risk for breast cancer and other health problems that are showing up now, a new federal study …
Millions of women in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s who wanted to make sure they had safe pregnancies, took a drug called DES. The women likely didn`t know it then, but that drug came with side effects that are surfacing 50 plus years later in their children. …
Millions of women exposed to the first synthetic form of estrogen are at risk of cancer . A National Institutes of Health study followed daughters of pregnant women given synthetic estrogen called DES from the 1940’s to the 1970s. … Drugs women took years ago may affect daughters WNDU-TV
A drug millions of pregnant women took decades ago may increase health risks among their daughters. An estimated four million Americans were exposed to DES, a synthetic estrogen prescribed to prevent miscarriages and pregnancy complications, …
A new federal study finds that a drug that millions of pregnant women took decades ago to prevent miscarriage and complications has put their daughters at higher risk for breast cancer. Cancer and other health problems are showing …
by Art Writ, October 6th, 2011 Decades ago, women have taken a certain drug that lessens the risk of miscarriage. However, just recently, researchers have found out that the complications and side effects of this drug has placed their daughters at …
Les femmes exposées dans le ventre de leur mère au Distilbène, premier œstrogène de synthèse utilisé dès 1940, souffrent de nombreux problèmes de reproduction et sont soumises à un net accroissement du risque de certains cancers, selon une vaste étude …
Une étude menée par les chercheurs de l’Institut National du Cancer américain publiée aujourd’hui dans le New England Journal of Medecine révèle de nouveaux effets négatifs liés à l’exposition intra-utérine au distilbène. En cause : des risques accrus …
Une étude menée par des chercheurs de l’Institut national américain du cancer (NCI) montre que des femmes exposées au stade fœtal au Distilbène, un œstrogène de synthèse, souffrent aujourd’hui de problèmes de reproduction et sont davantage sujettes à …
Les résultats d’une vaste étude publiée aujourd’hui dans le New England of Medicine révèlent que les femmes exposées au Distilbène dans le ventre de leur mère sont soumises à un risque accru de cancer. Entre 1948 et 1976, 200 000 femmes ont été …
Reproductive tissues are not the only targets of DES. The immune system is also known to be a target for estrogens. Dr. S. Ansar Ahmed, professor of immunology at Virginia Tech, led a National Institutes of Health study in the 1990s on how exposure to DES in utero affects the immune system later in life using a mouse model.
Di-Ethyl Stilbestrol was sold under many names including Distilbène®, Stilboestrol-Borne®, Benzestrol®, Chlorotrianisene®, Estrobene® and Estrosyn® to name just a few. Many companies manufactured and marketed this drug under more than 200 different brand names.
DES was not only sold generically under a multitude of brand names but also commonly administered in different shapes and forms: tablets, injections, vaginal suppositories and sometimes even as an ingredient in pregnancy vitamins.
In America alone there were 267 drug companies that made and distributed DES and other similar synthetic estrogens because it was un-patented and easily produced. Aggressive marketing pushed DES to also be used for more than 100 medical conditions.
No wonder most people who have been exposed to Diethylstilbestrol don’t even know about it! Check out our DES Drugsphoto album on Flickr.
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DES Action USA An estimated 5-10 million Americans were exposed to the anti-miscarriage drug diethylstilbestrol (DES). It has tragically caused cancers, infertility and other health problems. DES Action USA is the national nonprofit for those who were exposed.
DES Centrum Welkom DES-betrokkenen en medische professionals.
DES in Belgium DES in Belgium vzw heeft tot doel op te komen voor de belangen van DES-betrokkenen, slachtoffers van het medicijn Diëthylstilbestrol.
DES (Diethylstilbestrol) Info We welcome everyone from the DES community – Mothers, Daughters, Sons, 3rd Generation and Beyond, Transgender, and family and friends of DES-exposed – as well as those interested in learning more.
WONDER DRUG Scientific Drama currently at script stage inspired by the true story of DES (diethylstilbestrol), a toxic, carcinogenic drug seen as a medical miracle to help women with pregnancy issues and a cash cow for pharmaceutical companies upon its creation.
DES Daughter : @des_journal Twitter : Welcome to DES Daughter Journal on Twitter. Learn more about #diethylstilbestrol #DES #distilbene #DESdaughters #DESsons. Follow @des_journal for DES awareness.
DES Info : @DESInfo411 Twitter : The DES tragedy of in-utero exposure and its devastating effects on multiple generations must not be forgotten.
WONDER DRUG Movie : @WONDERDRUGMOVIE WONDER DRUG is a scientific drama about DES, the world’s first drug disaster.
Caitlin McCarthy : @CaitlinMcWriter Twitter : Official Twitter page for award-winning screenwriter Caitlin McCarthy. ‘Do or do not. There is no try.’ – Yoda.
Dr.Sara DETOX : @DrSaraDETOX Twitter : Dr. Sara is a highly skilled Naturopathic Doctor and Master Homeopathic Clinician, and is a well known expert in detoxification, weight loss and anti-aging.
Dial Doctors : @dialdoctors Twitter : 24/7/365 On Call Doctors, Consultations by Phone/Email + Dental, Vision & Prescription Plan. Affordable Health Benefits for America.
Jerry Wollaston : @JerryWollaston Twitter : Promises Made-Promises Kept I wrote -I Said I Will- to remember the good times. I wrote to come to grips with the bad times. I wrote to fulfill a promise.
Karen Fernandes : @KMFDallas Twitter : Karen Fernandes has been a nurse for over thirty years and is founder and president of AYR Consulting Group.
Want to know more about the pregnancy drug DiEthylStilbestrol?
New AFSSAPS DES survey and update DES historical facts, current issues, risks associated with DES exposure, breast cancer risks, post adolescent psychiatric disorders, risks for the 3rd generation, DES pregnancy care.
DES Sons Numbers and Health Concerns Although less is known about the consequences of diethylstilbestrol exposure in men than in women, important DES health concerns have been identified.
DES Sons Studies The most common reported health issues in DES sons studies are epididymal cysts, testicular problems, testicular cancer, infertility, psychological and neurological effects.
Gender Identity and DES Exposure Dr. Dana Beyer radio interview on the significant evidence linking prenatal Diethylstilbestrol DES exposure with gender identity and transsexual development.
Historic DES Breast Cancer Court Cases Boston Federal Courthouse holds the first DES Breast Cancer court cases on behalf of 53 DES Daughters September 07-23 2011.
Want to know more about the pregnancy drug DiEthylStilbestrol?
DES Cancer Link 40th Anniversary Guest post from DES Daughter and WONDER DRUG screenwriter Caitlin McCarthy; DES cancer link 40th anniversary triggers a flurry of press coverage.
DES National Public Education Campaigns Carol Devine radio interview on the silence around the DES issue and the difficulties to push for a DES National Education Campaign.
Distilbène®: 20 Years of Legal Battle First Distilbène® lawsuits, first victories for DES daughters, historical turning point and first victory for DES third generation against UCB Pharma.
Over the past few days, there has been an unprecedented flurry of media attention on DES related health issues. This come after a long-awaited DES study was published on October 06th in the New England Journal of Medicine (MEJM) which carefully documents elevated risk for women exposed to diethylstilbestrol (DES in short) for a host of medical problems including cancer, infertility, ectopic pregnancies, preterm labour, …. As yet, there has been no coverage from the 
