<qa>  What was the trial performed in the period before the scheduled surgery?The trial was performed in the period before the scheduled surgery. After informed consent, the patients were sequentially assigned to one of the following treatment groups: Control-group no hormonal treatment; Tibolone-group 2.5 mg tibolone Livial, N.V. Organon, Oss, The Netherlands administered orally every day, starting 21 days prior to surgery; E2 group 2 mg of estradiol administered orally every day, starting 21 days prior to surgery; E2MPA-group 2 mg estradiol 5 mg MPA administered orally every day, starting 21 days prior to surgery. The investigators were kept blinded to the patient treatments during the analysis. The study protocol was approved by the local ethics committees of the participating hospitals. 