Women’s risk of angina or stroke ‘affected by reproductive duration’

Every one-year increase in reproductive duration - the years from menarche (a woman’s first period) to menopause - is associated with a three per cent reduction in a woman's risk of angina or stroke, according to a new study.

The results, demonstrated in women 60 years of age and older, support a protective role for oestrogen, say the researchers behind the study, from the University of Florida, Gainesville, US.

Co-authors Dr Hend Mansoor, Dr Islam Elgendy, Dr Richard Segal, and Dr Abraham Hartzema, have presented their findings in an article published in the Journal of Women's Health.

The researchers compared cardiovascular and cerebrovascular events among women divided into two groups - longer reproductive duration (more than 30 years from beginning to end of menstruation) and shorter reproduction duration (less than 30 years). They explained that they performed subgroup analysis for five-year increments in the longer duration group.

Dr Susan Kornstein, editor-in-chief of the Journal of Women's Health and executive director of the Virginia Commonwealth University Institute for Women's Health, Richmond, Virginia, US, said: "By evaluating women's risk of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular events based on the duration of their reproductive years, rather than just their age at menarche or their age at menopause as individual variables, Mansoor et al. take into account the effect of cumulative exposure to sex hormones such as oestrogen.”ADNFCR-2094-ID-801837376-ADNFCR