**5. The role of hormonal therapy in management of endometrial cancer**

Many endometrial cancers express estrogen (ER) and progesterone (PR) receptors, and hence hormonal therapy can be applied as reasonable therapeutic choice in patients with hormone receptor-positive endometrial cancers. The presence of ER and PR receptors largely provides a powerfully predictive value in evaluating therapeutic response to hormonal therapy.

Primary hormonal therapy (without surgical intervention) to preserve fertility in child-bearing women with endometrial cancer has shown some degree of success, although the vast majority of patients ended up receiving the definitive therapy (that is, total abdominal hysterectomy) [86, 87]. As opposed to adjuvant radiotherapy, chemotherapy or combined radio-chemother‐

apy, hormonal therapy is hardly ever considered as one of the "primary" adjuvant treatment regimens in management of patients with endometrial cancer [86, 87]. Currently, hormonal therapy is largely employed for management of patients with poor performance status or recurrent/advanced/metastatic endometrial cancers, with the advantages of low morbidity, few drug-related side effects and relatively suboptimal therapeutic response [86, 87].

The most frequently employed hormonal agents for management of endometrial cancer include: progesterone/progestin, selective estrogen receptor modulators (SERMs), gonadotro‐ pin-releasing hormone (GnRH) agonists, and aromatase inhibitors [86-90].
