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Blood Test Helps Predict Menopause

16 July 2010

Researchers have developed a blood test they say can predict when a woman will become menopausal. The blood test measures levels of a hormone called anti-Mullerian Hormone (AMH), which is produced by the egg cells in women’s ovaries and is a marker for ovarian function. The test may be able to let women as young as 20 know when they are likely to enter the menopause. Sixty-three women reached menopause during the course of the study, and the test was able in most cases to predict the age within about four months of the woman’s actual age; the maximum margin of error was between three and four years.

Study author Fahimeh Ramezani Tehrani, president of the Reproductive Endocrinology Department of the Endocrine Research Centre and associate professor of Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences in Tehran, Iran, reported her findings at the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology in Rome.

The findings could have implications on how women approach family planning. Researchers said it is one of the first population-based studies to provide a statistical model for predicting age at menopause.

“We developed a statistical model for estimating the age at menopause from a single measurement of AMH concentration in blood samples,” Ramezani Tehrani says. “Using this model, we estimated mean average ages at menopause for women at different time points in their reproductive life span from varying levels of serum AMH concentration. We were able to show that there was a good level of agreement between ages at menopause estimated by our model and the actual age at menopause for a subgroup of 63 women who reached menopause during the study.”

Predicting Menopause With a Blood Test

The study results are based on blood samples from 266 women aged 20 to 49 who were part of the larger Tehran Lipid and Glucose Study, which began in 1998 and continues today. Blood samples were repeatedly collected from the study participants every three years, and the researchers also collected data about the women’s socioeconomic backgrounds and reproductive histories. The average age of beginning menopause was about 52.

Ramezani Tehrani and her team found that:

Women who had AMH levels of at least 4.5 ng/mL at age 20, 3.8 ngl/mL at age 25, and 2.9 ng/mL at age 30 could expect menopause to begin after they turned 50.

“The results from our study could enable us to make a more realistic assessment of women's reproductive status many years before they reach menopause,” says Ramezani Tehrani. “For example, if a 20-year-old woman has a concentration of serum AMH of 2.8 ng/mL, we estimate that she will become menopausal between 35-38 years old.”

Ramezani Tehrani says more studies are needed to validate these findings, but the blood test could be an important diagnostic tool to evaluate one’s reproductive life and could provide a more accurate response than chronological age. If these findings are confirmed by larger studies, women may be able to use this information when deciding whether or not to delay having a family; those predicted to have an early menopause may be best advised to plan earlier rather than later and this would be particularly helpful for women with a family history of early menopause.

Ref  Whether age at menopause is predictable using Anti-Mullerian serum concentration?

F.RamezaniTtehrani, N.Shakeri, F.Azizi

European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology 26th Annual Meeting, Rome, June 27-30, 2010.


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