DO WOMENS PREMENSTRUAL SYMPTOMS AND THEIR MOTHERS CLIMACTERIC HISTORYPREDISPOSE TO THEIR OWN VASOMOTOR SYMPTOMS

The purpose of this study was to assess whether women with vasomotor s ymptoms more often have had premenstrual symptoms than women without v asomotor complaints. Furthermore, the aim was to assess whether there was a correlation between the prevalence of women's vasomotor symptoms and their mothers symptoms. A postal questionnaire was sent to all 1, 324 women aged 55 and 56 years in the community of Linkoping, Sweden. Furthermore, a semistructured interview was undertaken with 33 postmen opausal women: 16 women with pronounced vasomotor symptoms and a contr ol group of 17 women who had never had vasomotor symptoms. Questions w ere asked about previous premenstrual symptoms and current as well as previous vasomotor complaints. The women were also asked about their m others' vasomotor complaints. The questionnaire was returned from 84.7 % of the women. There was a significant positive association between v asomotor symptoms and previous premenstrual symptoms. Previous moderat e to severe premenstrual symptoms were reported by 49% of the women wh o had moderate to severe vasomotor symptoms and only by 24% of the wom en who had experienced no or only slight vasomotor symptoms (chi(2) = 69.6; p much less than 0.001). Women who had vasomotor symptoms report ed that their mothers had suffered from vasomotor complaints significa ntly more often than women without symptoms. This was the case in both the questionnaire study and in the interview. We propose that a contr ibuting factor to the association between premenstrual symptoms and po stmenopausal vasomotor symptoms may be that women with these symptoms are more sensitive to, or have more pronounced, neurotransmittor chang es in the hypothalamus. Furthermore, we found a positive association b etween the prevalence of vasomotor symptoms in women and their mothers . This may also support the hypothesis that some women are more sensit ive to hypothalamic changes, although many other reasons, like recall bias, are possible.