Depression linked to early onset of menopause

Women who suffer from depression at some point in their lives are twice as likely to have an early perimenopause as those with no history of the mood disorder, researchers have found.

The report, from the ongoing Harvard Study of Moods and Cycles, also said that women on antidepressants were three times more likely to go into perimenopause early.

Perimenopause usually occurs in a woman’s 40s and lasts for two to four years. It is the interval before menopause when ovarian function slows and estrogen and progesterone levels begin to decrease.

For three years, researchers at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston followed 976 premenopausal women, age 36 to 45, tracking their menstrual cycles and checking the hormone levels in their blood every six months. About 300 of the women had a history of depression. According to the study, in the January issue of Archives of General Psychiatry, these women had a 20% increase in risk of entering perimenopause sooner than the women with no depression.

“The precise mechanism underlying this finding isn’t clear, but depression may accelerate the pace of ovarian decline,” says coauthor Lee S. Cohen, director of the Center for Women’s Mental Health at Massachusetts General Hospital.

More information on mood disorders in women is available at the center’s Web site, www.womensmentalhealth.org.

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-- Dianne Partie Lange