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Women’s
Biological Clock revealed: Hormone may
predict age at Menopause
Newswise — Age at menopause may now be predicted more
realistically according to a new study
accepted for publication in the Journal
of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM).
The study revealed that anti-Müllerian
hormone (AMH) levels are related to the
onset of menopause and are able to specify a
woman’s reproductive age more accurately
than chronological age alone.
The levels of AMH in the blood reflect the number of small
follicles present in a woman’s ovaries. This
follicle stock enables reproduction by
ensuring monthly ovulations. Depletion of
the stock leads to menopause, which normally
occurs between 40 and 60 years of age.
“Couples often postpone childbearing until after age thirty,
even though variation in menopausal age and
corresponding variation in natural fertility
means that some women are sterile as early
as their thirties,” say Dr. Jeroen van
Disseldorp and Dr Frank Broekmans of the
University Medical Center Utrecht in
Utrecht, the Netherlands.
“Knowing when menopause may occur could greatly impact
childbearing decisions and our findings show
that such knowledge may now be available
from AMH levels.”
For this study, AMH levels were measured in
144 healthy, fertile women and the data were
used to determine an estimate of mean AMH as
a function of age. This information was then
used to estimate the distribution of the age
of menopause in a sample of 3,384 women
between the ages of 50 and 70. Researchers
were then able to develop a model based on
AMH level and age that could predict age at
menopause for individual women.
Prediction for younger women may be more problematic since
observed AMH levels were underrepresented at
younger ages, and a recent study in mice
show that mean AMH levels do not decline at
young ages.
Other researchers working on the study include Malcolm Faddy
of Queensland University of Technology in
Brisbane, Australia; Axel Themmen and Frank
de Jong of Erasmus Medical Center in
Rotterdam, The Netherlands; and Petra
Peeters and Yvonne van der Schouw, of Julius
Centre for Health Sciences and Primary Care,
University Medical Center Utrecht, The
Netherlands
The article “Relationship of Serum Anti-Müllerian Hormone
Concentration to Age of Menopause,” will
appear in the June issue of JCEM, a
publication of The Endocrine Society.
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