Scientists find way to predict timing of menopause
Iranian scientists say they have developed a way of using a simple blood test to predict accurately when women will reach the menopause, offering the chance for women to plan for family and career far in advance.
The test, which measures levels of a hormone produced by cells in the ovaries, was able to predict the age at which women reached menopause to within an average of 4 months, according to data to be presented at the conference of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology in Rome.
"The results ... could enable us to make a more realistic assessment of women's reproductive status many years before they reach menopause," said Ramezani Tehrani of the Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences in Tehran, who led the study.
Experts commenting on the work agreed it was promising, but said its findings would need to be confirmed in larger trials.
"The possibility of an accurate predictor for menopause is very exciting. People have been looking for something like this for years," said Dagan Wells of the Nuffield Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at Oxford University.
The average age for menopause is 51, with ovulation in most women ending sometime between age 40 and 60. But it can happen later or earlier, making it difficult for women who want to develop a career before having babies to know how long to wait.
Tehrani's team took blood samples from 266 women aged between 20 and 49 who were also taking part in another study called the Tehran Lipid and Glucose Study, which started in 1998.
They then measured concentrations of a hormone called the anti-Mullerian Hormone (AMH) that is produced by cells in women's ovaries. AMH controls the development of follicles in the ovaries from which eggs develop, and the scientists suspected it might be useful for judging ovarian function.
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